Another of Jake’s hardscaping project on the books, which I will post for the benefit of this blog because I did help a lot. Before we bought the house there was once an asphalt path that wound around the garage.
Somewhere in the construction of the new house, that path was torn up and never replaced. We used a gravely dirt patch to walk around the house, but its bounds were always unclear and it tended to puddle in rain. To solve the problem and beautify, we installed a beachy stone-dust and stepping stone path lined with concrete edgers.
First, we planned the shape of the new path with the help of a garden hose. In these before shots, you can clearly see where the old path used to be, but the edges have been overrun with clover and weeds.
After we measured and marked the new path’s path, it was time to dig. The soil here is very rocky, and all the rocks needed to be removed so the sand could be leveled. It was laborious and slow.
With the edgers in place, the rocks removed, and the sand leveled and tamped, the pathway was already looking great! Jake did all of this himself. I only helped with a little digging after work.
We both worked together to lay the weed barrier and staple it in place.
Finally, Jake filled the entire thing with stone dust. I helped place the stepping stones and he tamped and wet down the dust.
The finished walkway reminds me of Cape Cod and the crunchy beach paths found there.
In the future, I’ll remove any remaining grass from the inside of the path and put down new mulch to create a well defined planting bed.
