The Finished Fence

Over the weekend I finished building the fence that I set posts for way back in November 2008 and installed the horizontal framing in May 2009. I guess I had a good excuse because it was winter. It turned out really well seeing as I have never built a fence before. It may seem like I know what I am doing but I have absolutely no training in building. Here are some photos:

Here is the main part of the fence that runs along the side shared driveway. Like I previously blogged about I installed the framing to mimic the design of our windows with the large panel below with small panels above. I did the inset at the bottom to provide added parking space at the back. The top right corner is partly showing a planter box I built to grow annual vines in. Now all that is left is to build the gate which will be done next week, I swear I will not put it off for a month!

There is also some landscaping planned for the area to be done in July. Previously the yard entrance was to the right of the photo and the dirt area was a garden. I have decided I have to many gardens so this area will now have a 10'x12' deck against the back of the house. It will have the grill and a couple chairs on it. The remaining dirt area will be lawn and a flag stone path the will lead to the shed, gate & house.

Here is a photo showing the last section of fence to close off this side of the yard. At some point this summer I will continue the fence along the back as well.

Here is a photo showing how I mitered the fence around the shed slabs. This was completely unnecessary as a shrub hides it but I know it's there.

Here is a close up of the arbor as requested by Suburban Gardening, not sure how I forgot it. The scroll ends were done with a hole saw on my drill and the straight cuts were done with my circular saw and speed square as a straight edge. The 90 degree side was used for the straight cut and the 45 degree side was used for the angled cut. I took a bunch of pictures well building it so I will post a how to about it next week.

There is not much to update on the garden front as I was barely in the patch all weekend. I did make sure my fall seedlings were kept well watered and the whole garden got a good soaking tonight because things were starting to wilt. I am really trying to reduce my watering this year, last year I watered every day. This year I am going to monitor the garden and only water when it is showing signs of being too dry. We are metered so there is cost motivation but it is also not good to over water because it washes away nutrients and can cause a lot of insect problems, particularly slugs. Of course there is also that whole environmental thing that seems to be all the rage now a days.