Something has finally happened!

The area between our house and sidewalk is covered with some rather ugly concrete. Many houses on the street have much nicer front gardens, with the opportunity to grow plants up the front of the house or a hedge along the small wall adjacent to the sidewalk. While it is too early to think about planting anything, as it might be killed when the construction finally gets under way, we got the concrete removed last week. It now looks 100% better.

Here is a picture of some of the rubble:

Here is the lovely dirt underneath the rubble:

And more dirt. An extremely decayed ceramic pipe leading from the downspout of our gutters was uncovered. In theory, this should conduct water out to the street, but in fact the water was probably just sitting underneath the concrete. We now have some proper drainage.

Here is the finished product. There is a layer of manure mixed with compost (from Madingley Mulch, for you manure connoisseurs), followed by a weed protection barrier and a covering of Cotswold stone.