DIYS Gardening Part II

Originally, I had planned to buy a couple of raised garden bed kits. Each one would be about 8 feet by 4 feet. After shopping around I found most raised bed kits were 4ft by 4ft and about 12 inches deep for about $60 each kit. OMG, I was surprised to say the least. I felt the 10ft by 16ft space could hold three 4ft by 8ft beds with nice walkway between each bed. At the current rate I would have to spend way over my budget to put in exactly what I wanted.

I also want to put in a rocky bed of river-washed stones. Something that would give me a nice walkway between the bed, but your could kneel on without too much trouble. If the stones are well eroded and and small enough the rock bed can be quite cushy.

All of this gets me too my first picture. To cover the entire bed with rocks would take about 58 bags of stone. Even at the cheap $2.50 a bag price, I'd spend far too much in one weekend. Let's not even talk about the pre-made plastic bed. If I want 8 by 4 foot beds I would have to build them from lumber. I can do that, but I wanted to at at least finish the rock bed over the weekend. It occurs to me that I don't have to cover the entire area, I just need to cover the space not taken by the raise bed. That's where the frames you see come in.

The frames act as a guide the the rock bed. They also weight the plastic down so the plastic doesn't blow away. The frames will also act as a template for the raised beds, will anchor the final result and provide support for the the bed when I add the dirt.

The frames mark out enough space that the number of bags of stone I needed went from 58 bags down to just 20 bags. The stone was on sell at Menard's for 2.38, so I was under $50 that weekend. The two by fours for the frames were cheap too. I only needed nine of them. That added another $15 to the weekend, but it would let me wait until I found a great price on the wood planks I would need later.

I spent the rest of Saturday afternoon filling in the walk-space. Then spent Sunday, leveling and tamping down the rock-bed. Don't they look nice?