A little bit of green...

Our lawn is finally done. We got our grass from a nursery/grass depot called Inglewood Grass and Nursery in Chakas Rock, Ballito. Check out their website here. The type of grass we got is called Berea Grass (Dactyloctenium austral). It is a lush, soft looking grass with a slightly broad leaf and a pointed tip. 

It is amazing how much of a difference a little bit of grass makes. Not only does it cool down our back yard by at least 2 or 3 degrees, and look really great, it is also very good for the soul. The dogs also seem to quite enjoy it but here's a little side note for you:

*After you have spent all morning laying down your lovely lush green grass, don't go out and leave a Labrador and Jack Russel puppy alone. They WILL lift up a section of your brand new grass and dig a huge crater!* Luckily the damage wasn't too bad and we managed to put it all back down again.

The first thing we did when we arrived home with the back of the kombi FULL of rolled up grass, was put down some top soil and fertilizer. We used 3 bags of top soil and 3 bags of fertilizer for 13m2 and mixed it into the sand/soil we already had, about 150mm deep. 

After it was mixed in, we just leveled it out with a rubber rake. 

We then began rolling out the grass. It was much like rolling out pieces of carpet. We just layed them edge to edge with a slight overlap. The whole process only took about an hour and wasn't nearly as labour intensive as last weekend when we lifted all the bricks.

 

We trimmed it around the edges and used the smaller off cuts to fill in any other odd spaces that were left. We thought we could just cut the pieces off with a spade but found it didn't really work too well, so we just used some shearing scissors and it worked perfectly.

 

After all the grass was down, we watered it and compressed it. To compress it the suppliers recommend rolling the grass with a heavy roller for larger areas but our area wasn't very big and we didn't have a roller, so we just put down a plank of wood and stomped it down.

Lastly, we added some nice little stepping 'stones' to finish off our lawn. We have actually lifted them up for the moment and want to wait for a few weeks before putting them down so the grass has a chance to take and put down roots.

Now all thats left to do is water it everyday for two to three weeks, and hope and pray it takes root.

Relaxing after a hard days work. 

On Sunday we decided to put up a vertical garden, I must say it turned out really well and wasn't all that difficult. A walk in the park actually, compared to last weekends brick lifting.

We can't wait to show you some pics of how it turned out. Watch this space for pics and our first attempt at a step-by-step: 'How to build your own vertical garden'.