A new addition

And so here it is... the reason for the rush on the final fence countdown.... our newest addition to the family.

Everyone, meet Beans Bravis!

Born on January 8th, we got him from a breeder up in Sydney and brought him home last weekend at eight weeks old, much to the cat's disgust. 

He's slowly settling in, and making good use of the backyard we put so much effort into. I just hope the grass can hold up to his antics and chewing habits!

Landscaping, P2

The retaining walls were definitely the most technical, and expensive, part of the garden. Due to the site cut, we needed one along the side and one at the back of the property. The side one was a lot more difficult because it needed to step up in height from the back of the property to the front. It took a few days (over several weeks), but in the end, the guys did such a good job!

Since this one won't be visible from inside the back garden, as its below ground level, we used plain treated pine sleepers. The bits of the 'H posts' (the sleeper brackets) that you can see sticking up above where the sleepers end will be lopped before the fence is put on top.

Once the wall was up we could start moving some of the spare dirt from the site cut into the space behind it to build the ground up to level with the slab. This meant getting a turn using the digger!!

 

After the technicalities of the side wall, the rear retaining wall seemed easy. That is, disregarding Ben's minor measurement malfunction - resulting in one section between two of the concreted posts being too wide for the sleepers we had, and requiring us to order seven more longer, more expensive sleepers to fit the gap and correct it! But other than that, it was pretty straight forward and the guys had it up within a weekend. 

 

Over the next week or so, the rails went up...

  

And then it was time for the glory run - time for the palings!

We have Ben's sister Katira and her husband Grady, from the USA, staying with us for six months on a working holiday in Australia. So while Tira is out being a sugar mama (Australian citizenship made getting work a LOT easier for her) Grady has been staying home earning his keep working on the fence with Ben.

Between Ben's two jobs and Grady's golf tournaments, they chipped away at it over a week or so, a few palings here, a few palings there, til all the standard palings were up.

And last of all, the extra tall palings went up at the end where the normal fence meets the retaining wall fence. We got them milled specially tall, planning to cut down on an angle from top to bottom. Since then though, life has got in the way... and so they still stand at a mighty four metres tall, towering over the rest of the yard like turrets on a castle!