Stones and more stones...

Ah yes, the stone quarry. For the past 15 years Jim and I have been playing Fred & Wilma Flinstone. It's true.

We rent a truck and off to the Stonewall quarry we go. We try and venture out on cloudy days or on days that are not too brilliant in sunlight. For some reason the quarry becomes a bake-oven at high noon and without proper sun protection...well, it ain't pretty.

As the day is long, Jim and I stumbled over and in between the stones, rocks and boulders, just to find that right one. With rubber mallet in hand, we clobbered and hacked at the larger pieces and by day's end or pure exhaustion, we would have enough red limestone to barely frame one half a flowerbed. Usually our flowerbeds are lined 2 to 3 rows high.

That being said, we persevere every year and bring home the stone. I believe that the rented truck already knows its own way.

If you check out my way to outline flowerbeds, you will see that by spraying the desired flowerbed form on the ground first, then lay down landscaping fabric, then add 1/4 down stone on top of the fabric, you will have made a great base for the limestone...and no weeds will grow through. Another great reason for this kind of hardscaping border is that you can use the gas powered edgers without worrying about lobbing off the tops of your plants!

Once the limestone is laid, Jim still pours a bit of left over gravel in between the limestone. With all complete, the border is sturdy and after a few rains, viola...will not move.

A Caribbean Pond Oasis - The Begining

Can you imagine water so blue? In the Caribbean maybe...

We could not resist coloring the water. The dye used is 'critter' friendly and although I have heard it said that coloring the water doesn't look natural, we like it.

We used a heavy duty pool liner (the blue) and sand and poly as a base. Then we added the different sizes of river rock and finally placed odd sized boulders. All of the stones and boulders were delivered to our driveway and hauled to the back by us...oh...my aching back.

Creating a Wooden Retaining Wall

How do you like our new cedar fence? We have 266 more feet of fencing to build. With the new cedar fencing barely aged a week, pushing wet clay soil against it wouldn't be the smartest.

Back in 2005 when building our above/onground pool at our previous home, Jim created a sturdy retaining wall. Why? We were building the pool into the backyard slope. In order for there to be no issues, Jim decided that a half circle retaining wall would give the added protection for the pool sides. Please see http://www.my-gardening-and-landscaping-makeover.com/retaining-walls.html for complete instructions and images. Ergo, Jim decided to, on a much smaller scale, do the same for in front of the fence. This way the soil rests against the treated lumber and not the new cedar wood.

Jim left a space between the retaining wall and the fence for the placement of a weeping tile or also called a drainage pipe (made from corrugated plastic). He then covered the pipe with gravel. This space has also been renamed as the 'rabbit highway'.

Preparing The Flowerbeds

The weather forecasters called the spring of 2008 in Winnipeg as wet. Really? I thought that every spring was really, really wet in Winnipeg. After all, there is a ton of snow to melt!

The small kabota was no match for Winnipeg's soaked clay gumbo. After digging out the 2 ponds, Jim tried ever so slowly to move the clay dirt into mounds for my flowerbeds. Everything work fine until he reached a certain height. Then 'all heck' broke loose. It is with great thanks to our maker above or just great timing that Jim managed to jump out and free of the kabota as it fell to its side. The image shows Jim trying to push the tractor back up. Not going to happen.

With the help of the rental people and a winch, they up righted the beast and Jim continued his mission. By the way, the mission was accomplished!

Digging For Gardens and Ponds

In April of 2008, as the frost slowly left the ground (and I mean slowly), my husband Jim began his quest of digging the 2 Caribbean ponds and while he had the 'digger' in his possession (he had so much fun) it made sense to create my mounded flowerbeds.

Is it allowed to have fun using spray paint? We did. Prior to the digging, we purchased orange spray paint to outline our 2 ponds and outline the shape of all flowerbeds.

This ingenious idea came from Jim. In doing so, we realized that our larger pond would have been far too large and definitely unmanageable. We lobbed off at least 8 feet from the length and 3 feet from the width. Much better.