Last summer I started a fence project in our yard. It took a year, but it is now mission accomplished!
We had some unique challenges since we have an odd shaped yard. It's shaped like a baseball diamond sketched out by a drunk guy. And there is an easement running along the back, so we couldn't just go to the property line. Even so, we needed an area fenced for the dogs and our pool.
We considered building a privacy fence all the way around the yard - but didn't like that because it made the yard feel too closed in. It would also have looked pretty dorky because of the way our yard is shaped.
So Lauren came up with a great idea - fence off just less than half the yard with both privacy fence (along the back and front to keep the dogs from barking at people) and picket fencing facing the rest of our yard to open it up. She also liked the idea of building raised beds along the fence for her flowers and vegetable garden. It took me a little while to warm up to the idea, but when I finally saw what she was envisioning, I was sold. The only thing that I decided would make it better was an arbor to tie it all together.
This last week, I finally finished the construction. Yes, it took almost a year to finish. You know what they say - you can have it good, fast, and cheap - as long as you only pick two out of the three. Fast is usually the one I leave out - though occasionally I leave out both fast and good.
I still need to stain the fence - but that will have to wait till later in the summer. I enjoy working with my hands and Lauren's love language is "Acts of Service" - so this has been a win-win!
I sold my truck when I moved to Edwardsville, so I have had to learn how to adapt. The Honda Fit actually has an incredible amount of room - though I did get strange looks from other people in the parking lot each time I made a supply run.
Esther is a great helper, so I recruited her to help. She would say she became the site manager. The truth is somewhere in the middle
You never know what you will find when you start digging. We had to reroute the our downspout drainage system - it ran exactly through one of our fence-post holes!
I hadn't ever built a garden arbor before - thankfully Al Gore created a thing called the internet where you can find anything!
The dogs were a huge help during this process. Or maybe they were just good at being dogs.
And I finally found and hung the trellis pieces this month so Lauren's vines will have somewhere to go. Here is what it looks like now.
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