yay for dirt

"before" shot of rock wall - taken last weekend

"after" shot of rock wall with new stones added!

whew. stage one of back yard 'redo' is done. peeps, i cannot tell you how many years i have been waiting for this! it's so nice to finally have a level yard, albeit a very narrow one. as you can tell from the pics, the biggest drawback to the yard itself was not that i have a very ancient, home made rock wall (i actually kind of loved the wall), but that it sloped downward about 2' from the house to the wall. so, gardening was a challenge. and really, there was no way to add a fence with the unevenness of the wall, and the fact that there were several large, unruly stumps in the way.

ripping out the wall was, shall we say, 'cost prohibitive.'


until last week, when i found rudy, who said he could add to the top of the wall, no problem. so yesterday, he and a couple other really nice men came over and got things into shape. they removed the stumps, and started stacking stones, no cement necessary. it was really fun to see how fast they worked. these rocks are rather heavy, there is no way i could have lifted some of them.



for now, i had them leave this little row of bushes on the end near the alley. i might remove those later, but i kind of didn't have the heart to remove them yet. they actually fill in and get really pretty as the summer progresses.

phase 2 comes next week, when rudy and the guys will install a small patio (where the patch of grass is in the above photo) and a privacy fence. woo hoo! a privacy fence! and a patio! did you hear ME? ha. i'll put my adirondack chairs and my fire pit out there, and if i know myself, probably a gazillion pots and other colorful doo dads.

speaking of. i have been stalking a garden in california (via facebook) for a couple of years now. i am hoping that in 5 years, my garden will look a little something like this one!




dreams are good, aren't they?
happy day!