12 Oakdale

Now I know why people use raised garden beds rather than in-ground plots: rocks! I’ve spent hours clearing weeds from Mary’s backyard to get ready for paths and planting areas. Often I can’t get the shovel more than 1/2” before hitting rocks. Big rocks, little rocks, smooth rocks, rough rocks. I will never complain about my Saint Augustine grass and its matted roots again. Mary has dug a 10’ x 40’ strip to have steppingstones, mulch, and a little bridge over a dry stream bed. She’s found enough nice rocks to line the stream plus many, many more that she hasn’t decided what to do with. Perhaps a stone wall. Yesterday, Grant spent at least 2 hours digging the hole for the dwarf mandarin. He and Ryan also went to Home Depot and bought a circular saw to cut the boards for garden beds. I had already used 12’ pressure-treated boards for the first one, but they had warped so badly, the concrete end stones wouldn’t hold in place. By cutting them to 8’, we hoped we could use the straighter part...