Walkway (Continued)
By late July, the paver contractor set landscaping fabric so that weeds don't grow between the bushes. The fabric is the black material you see around the bushes. The fabric lays flat and is tucked underneath the border blocks. The border blocks and some scattered stones hold the fabric in place. The fabric allows rain to pass through, but blocks the light to prevent weeds.
On the day of this photo, I was laying additional fabric in the planting bed, and painting window trim!
Above you can see implements for leveling the ground (shovel, rake, hoe). An upside down trash barrel serves as a table for paint bucket.
To Be Continued later in this post.
Fireplace
While searching online for bathroom shelving, I discovered that you can buy modern mantel pieces or floating shelves. It was what the living room needed.
I ordered to be delivered, a Bjorn Woodworks Saga mantel. It's a floating shelf sort of like the one below. Bjorn makes woodworks in a rustic Nordic style.
The original mantel was in good shape, but the style was not doing great keeping up with the times.
First step was to pull out the old mantel. Luckily there were no surprises underneath! Below, you can see the outline where the mantel was. I saved the old mantel.
The plan changed, to also remove the white fireplace border, to refurbish it. Below, all that's left is fireplace brick and wall board.
The plan changed again, once I googled fireplace ideas. I learned that chalk paint can be used on old brick and stone work. Below, I gave the bricks a chalk paint treatment. You take chalk paint, mix in Plaster of Paris for texture. Since I didn't have any plaster, I instead used powdered lime from the garden shed.
Below, you can see the refurbished white border. I removed the mouldings for a more modern touch. In the picture below, you can see how many tools are used.
Correction: that straight-edge stick is actually the bracket that the new mantel will hang on.
* The bracket gets screwed into the wall studs for maximum support.
Below is the new mantel shelf
Intermission
The Central New York Regional Market, Syracuse NY
It is a bustling place every Saturday!
Just about everything imaginable is grown locally. Not the tropical fruit of course.
Completion of the walkway
Below is the tag on a Moonglow Juniper, planted to the left of the new front stairs. Since I'm not putting up a railing, bushes will will look nicer against the stairs.
Saturday 8/14/21
Below, you can see the landscape fabric in the planting bed. Some rocks are weighing it down. To the right up against the house, you see bare ground. There is one more row of fabric to go in that area.
The final step was to spread mulch in the planting bed. Mulch was $36 per load and I got two loads. One load fills about half the pickup truck. At the nursery they use a Bobcat with a scoop, one scoop per load. One load is 3/4 cubic yards.
There are no photos of getting or spreading the mulch, due to a rush before the dinner guests arrived. A photo of the pot rack is provided instead, as it is holding out very well.
Morning Light
Epilog
Two or three large round boulders would look great among those bushes. It could cost around $2000 to have them delivered, so the boulders will have to wait.
