Remember, back in April, when I posted Front Steps Pt 1? Approximately six months later and I have progressed all of about four months in the history I am trying to document! Yes, the photos below were taken between Christmas and New Year, 2006. (27-30th)

So far, Dad has dug out the old sandstone steps and replaced them (with recycled concrete slab sections). Now he has dismantled the old sandstone dry wall and is moving it in, so the edges of the steps are concealed and locked in.

Notice the steel bars? It's amazing what you can do with a trampoline.

Can you see the reason for the steel?

Da daa! The handrail. Yes, it is a eucalypt sapling - specially chosen and chopped, out on a friend's block.

No laughing, you have no idea how many comments and complements we've received in regards to this handrail!

The only object that has been more commented on, amongst our friends and within our community, is our new front fence - but you'll just have to wait a little longer to see that structure for yourselves! Watch out picket fence: you won't be standing there much longer.

As things stood, on the 4th October, 2006, we had a front gate, a kitchen door and nothing except grass in between. This was about to change, and Blick was the energetic instrument...




...with a little help.

As can (hopefully) be seen, we didn't dig the path, we dug gardens for Mum (she can always use more) that would eventually define the shape of the path. The yellow lines on the grass indicate the path space.

Date: 13.09.06
Time: 1:30 - 5:30pm










Slick: much more than a Carpenter Joiner.

Gradually the stone walls began to grow, carving order out of the wilderness . Mounds of earth, stone and concrete began to resolve into pleasing lines and useful spaces.









Of course none of this would have happened without Dad's landscaping genius and sheer hard work! I assure you, the clay Dad had to struggle with was No Joke.

On moving onto the property there were already old sandstone steps up to the front gate, but they were old, sunken and wobbly - a liability. These sandstone blocks were taken up and set aside. They were used when Dad rebuilt the stone walls (which had also become tumbled and rickety) over the edges of the new steps, once they were finished. Unfortunately I only have photos from the middle of the project.




We began at the bottom and worked our way back up the hill. The proper calculations were done though; the steps didn't work out evenly by accident!




Above photo take from across the road. The railway is behind the photographer.



And our final photo ...



A sneak peak into the future (December 27th, 2006). All the steps can be seen, while the stone walls are being re-built over the edges to finish it off and tie it all together.

Note the fence. It didn't last much longer!

From July 10th, 2006 to July 20th, many different things were in the pipeline. Dad began on the first steps, using concrete slabs that the bobcat had dug out of the ground. Waste not, want not.





It was a cold winter.



Here we are just fooling around in the late afternoon sun, but there are some interesting details in the background. The main one is the infamous diamond pane window, temporarily installed on the front of the house. (Between the younger girl's heads.) As can probably be imagined, the view through the window, as opposed to around the edges, was paltry and very interrupted by such small panes. Where it ended up, on the back of the house, there is a pretty view, but a short range view, of the garden. The small diamond panes seem to enhance that view, instead of hindering it.

Those readers with sharp eyes may be able to pick out a square-ish window tacked up under the peak of the roof. At this stage we were thinking to turn the veranda we'd enclosed (that we were trying to decide on windows for) into a dining room or sitting room with a cathedral ceiling. A cathedral ceiling because of the subtle difference that would make to the atmosphere of the room, and the light and view we could then access. The square window was basically to let a little extra light in. But we ended up changing our minds - for a change! We still altered the ceiling height in that room, but ended up dropping it eight or so inches, instead.



Figuring out the fence line. I believe that where the string line is being held, the corner post was to be.




'Scuse my scowl, again, I appear to have a gift for pulling horrible faces. Actually, the sun reflecting off the foil backed insulation, straight into our eyes. Mum and I were trying to sort out the window situation. As can be seen below, Dad is suggesting window heights.



In the end we decided to keep the top of the glass in the windows level, all the way across the house.

Day one, June 16th, and our bobcat man starts some major earth moving. No longer shall the hill slope straight down to and under our house. Drainage installed, and the ground under our house has been dry since.




End of the first day. What a mess!

Next day a flatter area was formed between shed and house:



Ever played with a wacker-packer? Interesting sensation.




A flat path along the back (uphill) side of the house, and a driveway formed. When we bought the property there was little evidence of a driveway, except for extremely hard ground and a scattering of gravel.



Drive down to shed, and levelled area between buildings.



Path. The dirt on the left was clay mud six inches deep, wet by lots of rain and well churned by the bobcat tracks.



Though it looks as though the drive has a kink in it, the flatter area where the bobcat is driving is now a part of our parking space outside our fence line. (We had to have our property surveyed to find out what our boundary lines were; the previous owner had just fenced in a roughly rectangular block, including council property but excluding his own triangle up the top.) Once we'd figured out where our fence line was going, we were able to decide on our driveway. It's now straight up the hill from the photographer, toward the front of the truck tray.

This landscaping was one of the most important aspects of the development of this property. It accomplished several things: it shaped the land into four separate levels, which gardens later made more distinct and unique; it protected the house foundations from excessive movement caused by moisture fluctuation; it made the house begin to look part of the landscape, rather than an interruption to the flow of the hill; and it outlined final use of space by providing areas for rest, for traffic, for transition and for car parking/access. This property would not be half so attractive or useful, if we hadn't done this earth moving.