Archive for the ‘driveway’ Category

Trim

Friday, February 26th, 2010

SoCal Edison sent a crew to come trim the HUGE tree in our neighbors backyard. It’s been interfering with the power lines and is an all around “nuisance” so accordingly it needed to get hacked up.

It’s hard to describe the scale of this tree. It’s big, just really massive. The only way to access it is for trimming was on our freshly installed gravel. All the utility guys love to use our big open driveway…

That’s the trimmer dude. He kept waving when he saw I was taking pictures. He’s so high!

I’m glad they put so many cones out. Who knows what kind of traffic or pedestrians could walk into the “trim zone” in our backyard.

NNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOO. Our fresh and lovely driveway covered in pine needle debris. The tragedy.

They gotta come out back next week and finish up, but they really butchered the crap out of the tree. It’s all flat and naked on our side.

Driveway

Thursday, January 14th, 2010

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The gravel driveway is compacting down nicely…and the dirt front yard is coming along as well.

I’m finally coming around to loving the gravel driveway. It was a huge compromise and not my “dream” choice but considering the low cost and the high functionality, I’m leaning on the side of awesome.

Have you ever compromised on a project and been pleasantly surprised?

Side Yard

Wednesday, December 30th, 2009

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Some of that leftover gravel is headed over to our side yard which will be turned into an entertainment space fitted with cement square pavers, a fire pit, and lots’o crazy drought tolerant plantings. It’s going to be A to the Mazing if all goes as planned…

But, what have we accomplished in the two years of thinking and planning this area?

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Here is a before pic (from our inspection) of the area connecting the back yard to the side yard located behind the garage. We think the previous owner used it as a dog run or something else way more sinisterly creepy. It was lined with plywood, janky wood pallets and TONS of that hamster wood-shaving stuff. Smell = gross.

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We cleaned all that scariness out, lined the area with geotextile fabric and dumped about four inches of the driveway gravel down.

Much better.

So much more to do: fix the fence, create planting areas, level it all out, actually put paint on the house. It’s still not fully primed yet…six months after we began…jeeez.

2010! Year of the exterior!