C3 community parkland and walking track project - May

Please note this is a repost from my wifes blog http://arabelleswindow.blogspot.com.au

I'm so keen to share the past three weeks of community garden progress with you. It's been busy, hard work, but exciting as we start to see things taking shape. Look below to see the progress to date...

WEEK 13

Thursday

Hubby has been hard at it, clearing walking tracks through several acres of land. 

Ben is removing the screws from and old shed roof so we can use the tin elsewhere.

The front garden is starting to flourish and flower. Its so lovely to see colour from the road now- it brightens the place up.

It may be air conditioned, but it's now in the right position! It was moved to the side of church on Tuesday, and is ready to have a new roof and be used for secure storage.

Several of us helped with the removal of these internal shelving supports from the shipping container. It was a tough job, but hubby had a bright idea- the steel can be recycled into picnic table and chair frames. I like his thinking.

The shipping container in its new resting place, out of sight. The pavers from a no longer used pathway will eventually be all removed and used elsewhere too.

Saturday

Today, the church had a working bee. So many awesome people gave up their time on a Saturday to make the place look amazing. Here, the lovely Marika is beautifying the building with her soapy broom :)

The kids church area is now clean and open! The helpers moved the old shed into the shipping container, removed all of the gear into it as well, replaced pavers and generally did an awesome job.

Honestly, the amount of work that was done today saved us weeks. The tin was carried up from the back, ready for use. So much organising, tidying,  cleaning, repairing went on. We can't thank everyone enough.

WEEK 14

It's time to build a bridge. Mick did just that.

It is getting side rails, but for now, we have something wide and strong enough for even the ride on mower to cross.

This is the result of hours of hard work. Ben raked and dug for hours. I knelt down and painstakingly pulled as many Singapore daisy roots out as I could find. Then, Ben and I put cardboard and newspaper down, before hubby jumped in to help load wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow load of mulch for Ben to dump and me to spread.

When it was all done, I found a new home for all the beautiful bromeliads lovely Lorraine had donated.

So happy with the result!

This is our first large, completed garden bed. I was thrilled to discover a strangler fig growing up in the centre. In ten or so years time, this will look like tropical paradise.

WEEK 15

Monday

This has been a big week!

We love council clean up time, especially when doing a community garden. We just missed out on a free, giant tumbler compost bin. But we did score free hardwood planters, hardwood lengths and some tin sheeting. Hopefully, the tin may be used create compost bays. 

Tuesday

After a phone call from Tony, the patient home renovator who has allowed us to remove a truck load of pavers weeks ago, we were back today to collect some more. 

Yes, I am in a skip full of building rubble. Hubby and I had an interesting time collecting pavers from out of the skip and moving the car repeatedly for trucks to use the driveway. At least we managed a full trailer load.

Thursday

Community garden day. Sadly, only 1 helper turned up. People are allowed days off. I do admit though, this added to my lack of motivation. But even when feeling flat, all three of us did well. Slow progress is better than no progress.

Shane did a brilliant job raking the weeds and leaves off this, and removing much of the Singapore daisy too. It made weeding so much easier- as did the curb side score of a padded floor rug. My knees were grateful!

Another garden bed almost ready to go.

The front garden looks so beautiful and has become so lush in only a few weeks. Regular weeding and watering helps of course.

Hubby and I found something much better than cardboard or newspaper for the weed matting- we found piles and piles of carpet. Thank you, council clean-up! I am so keen to get it put down, mulch over it and get the gardens planted out.

Low maintenance gardening- here we come.

Thursday afternoon, and hubby and I were back into paver collecting. This time, from a side pile, which nearly gave us a whole trailer load.

The very last load from this house will be in 4-6 weeks time. Finally, I think we have enough!

Friday

This morning, while still in my pj's, I sat myself down and patiently collected the seeds from some dried agapanthus flower heads I'd been saving.

I filled my 26 peat pots with seed raising mix, carefully sowed the seeds before spraying well with water and covering. Hopefully, in several weeks, I'll have my own collection of seedlings ready to plant out in the community gardens.

Hubby and I also decided to escape for a bit, and of course, we ended up at Bunnings, where I went instantly to the garden centre. I purchased some wild iris tube stock and more fertiliser. Even though it's worth it for the gardens, our poor car wreaks! 

I really can't wait to get some more garden beds established and begin the planting out. Hubby has said I'm responsible for the garden beds-I couldn't be happier! 

Much more coming soon! Until then, thanks for reading :)

C3 community parkland and walking track project - week 12

Please note this is a repost from http://arabelleswindow.blogspot.com.au

I'm excited to bring you another big week for the community gardens :)

Thanks to our amazing team, we were able to get so much done on Thursday. Take a look at the photos below for details...

Logs and branches all lined up as neatly as possible for the loppers to mulch. I admit, Thursday was not a great day for me, so I didn't carry much at all. The boys did most of the work- Hubby, Graeme, Shane & Mick all worked hard either carrying trees or chopping them down.

Our first plant donation! With thanks to the beautiful, bubbly and generous Lorraine. These bromeliads already have a great space picked out for them- above the new patio/ seating area hubby has already started digging out.

Thank you!

Not easy to see from this distance, but the boys did a great job of removing the wire fence and brush cutting the weeds a bit. This area will soon be opened up. Exciting to slowly but surely create more usable space.

Friday, and the tree loppers are here! When I asked if I could take photos, they gladly obliged :)

The boys in action. The machine was incredibly loud! Even with ear muffs on. It was also faster than I expected. Even with hubby lopping additional weed trees, the boys smashed through the mulching in record time.

It doesn't look too impressive, but this is a great result!

The pile is best appreciated from a distance- it's quite a good amount of mulch to use for the bottom garden beds. After it's let to sit and weed seeds germinate for a few weeks first.

After a week of strong winds, some seedlings didn't fare so well. I replaced them with tough marigolds and daisies. 

These snapdragons are full of buds ready to bloom.

Can't wait to see the whole bed flowering soon.

Little by little, things are starting to come together. We have plans for a bridge, new walkways, a revamped bike track, seating and more! Stay tuned for more updates soon!

C3 community parkland and walking track projec - April

Please note this is a repost from my wifes blog http://arabelleswindow.blogspot.com.au

At long last, I am thrilled to bring you another community garden update!

As you will see, quite a lot of work has gone on. Mostly, in the form of collecting pavers. 

Week 8

I was out with a virus, so the boys continued digging a garden path without me.

Week 9

Hubby had been scouring Gumtree for free pavers, and after much searching, we headed off to Mudgeeraba with our trailer for what we thought would be just the one load...

This is the pile we had to collect from. The home owner assumed it would be about 1 cubic metre.

So, it was onto hands and knees, under the giant plant, to clear out paver after paver after paver...only to discover more and more.

I'm glad I'm not easily spooked. So many spiders! I even watched, at eyeball level, a large huntsman spider remove her equally large egg nest out of harms way.

We had a narrow, tree lined side drive to park in, making collection a little difficult. 

Three exhausting loads and a full day later, a Tuesday was well spent! Here is our impressive collection.

The next day, we went to check out another lot of free pavers for collection. A man had purchased a house to renovate, and wanted the pavers gone. We ripped up a few and discovered it wasn't too hard.

This section easily filled our trailer. But this was only a tiny amount of what needed to be removed.

So, the next day, we hired a truck, and rounded up as many helpers as we could. It was hot, hard work, but everyone did a phenomenal effort, clearing practically all of a huge, double driveway. 

From around 9am to 5 pm, our tag team of helpers, and my absolutely amazing hubby, collected tons of pavers. And I overcame my nerves and drove the truck!

This pile was the result of the day! Amazing effort, and more than enough to get the garden paths under way.

Week 10

More paver collection today. This time, the side driveway. I admit, I wasn't much help. Annoying fatigue and dizzy spells hit hard, so I could only do minimal work. My awesome hubby and Ben did a stellar effort though.

I was able to help Ben stack some pavers as he used the matic to pull them up.

Ben did a great job! Hubby too- lifting load after load of pavers into the trailer. He is a machine! Thankfully, we stopped after 2 trailer loads.

My eldest daughter came to the community garden site and helped unload when we got back. Grateful for the help!

Week 11

Though we still have a number of pavers to collect, we decided the best thing to do for now was to lay some and reduce the clutter around the garden. We have stored a lot of pavers! But this was also time for me to do some more relaxing aspects of gardening by sprucing up the front of church.

Hubby attached a hardwood cross to the front of church after removing some shrubs a few weeks back. Another amazing guy, Dale, re-painted the front. And I wanted to freshen up the space by planting some flowers.

I added few snapdragons, lavender, alyssum and verbenas for a splash of colour. It delights me that some adorable kids have taken an interest and like to help me water too :)

Hubby and our 2 awesome work-for-the-dole guys are starting on the path; one laying side pavers, hubby laying the main pattern, and one leveling ahead. I'm the photographer/ paver carrier :)

After the guys left, hubby and I continued. Quite the work-out I must say! 

Even collecting and adding the sand by sweeping it over the pavers is not easy.

Satisfying to see a solid pathway in though.

This week, we also got a tree-lopper in to quote us on the use of a chipper. It's expensive, but means we can make good use of all the trees we have been allowed to remove, and any dead ones we can collect. Ten cubic metres of mulch coming up! That is, after we move ALL of the trees we have cut down back into the clearing for ease of access. Next week promises to be a brilliant workout yet again.

As does the week after. Tony, the guy from whom we have collected the bulk of pavers, is happy to let us collect the remainder as he is still doing renovations and we won't hamper his work. Grateful for the pavers, but aware I need to purchase knee pads like hubby if I'm to survive another epic day!

We have run into a few issues with the gardens. One is the removal of what I now know is Singapore Daisy. This has got to be the most invasive weed I have ever come across. After doing some research, I now know that the reason the weed spray didn't kill it is it doesn't respond to a glyphosate based weed killer.  Lesson learned. 

We have also been a little frustrated by locals, literally using bolt cutters to break through re-wired fences. Traffic still persists, even after my terrible attempt to re-wire the fence last week. Now, they are back to jumping over the gates. Not sure how we will fix the 7 metre gap in the freeway fence though.

And today, hubby informed me that his several acres of marked out walking track ties have been removed and dumped in a hidden pile. I wonder who has time and energy for such activities?! And why would they bother?

As frustrating as setbacks are, we will forge ahead. It does seem apparent that many people aren't aware it's not public land. Soon enough, the place will start to take on new life, people will realise we aren't restricting their old pathways, but creating an amazing new space for everyone to enjoy. 

Setbacks won't stop us, we just need to get creative, and be as persistent and hard to stop as a Singapore Daisy!

I look forward to bringing more updates soon :)