What To Do Under Your Deck Stairs

A Moment of Levity Downtown Angola, IN

The jackets are off, shorts on and we are in full swing the weeks flying past with our busy pace. Since starting this blog I have always enjoyed the chance to sit back and reflect upon our work a bit, when I look over the jobs each week I can not help but be so proud of the men who build the visions.  Once again hats off guys a great start to 2014.

Ryan & Scott at The Top on This Hardscape

Custom Cut Bluestone Walk, Yeah Baby

Last Friday we installed most of the plants on this job, Monday comes the sod.  We are a bit ahead of schedule on this one but since we were out on Clear Lake opportunity arose, the homeowners seem pleased to see us early.  I really enjoy designing for small spaces great

reward for those who like immediate gratification.  This job was virtually drive right up to it space only real danger was crossing the road.  Gonna be super sweet.

Hemlocks, Butterfly Bushes & Hibiscus, Nice Combo on Lake George

 There was only one side of the house left to do at Tom & Patti's on Lake Gage and I must say I am very pleased at how it turned out.  For the first time I used 3 Columnar Sweetgum close to a house, they are a new tree for me and wonderful.  They only get about four feet in diameter and can grow up to 50' tall.  They do fruit and are a bit messy there but they have great fall color and lovely form, yippee a new tree.  Jim from Plant Center brought in several narrow varieties of trees with me in mind, we have been planting away.  Discovered new narrow tulip tree only grows about 15' diameter we have already planted five.

A New Variety of Sweetgum, Wonderful

Streambed in Progress

Finished Streambed, A Custom Fence to Block AC is Next

These Steps Match Those of the Waterfall on the Opposite Side

I  made some new friends on at Crooked Lake Beach club when we made our deadline for new landscaping before their weekend graduation party.  We got a late start on the project but I always knew when they wanted it done so we hit it with a big crew for two days, wham just like some TV show it went from a blank slate to a sweet retreat.  We also got invited to the party, wish we could have went but Bruce and I spent the weekend working on a rental property, not what we wanted to do.

This is a Big House Sitting on a Hill

What to do With That Space Under the Stairs

A big sod job on Clear Lake took a bite out of the week, 30 pallets down a step hill is never much fun, the first day it rained super hard by about 11:00 so the men had to quit at 8 pallets.  The sod cutting machine broke down the next day which put us behind a little bit, ended up what I planned to take two days took three to complete.  Actually the result was good since we did some other work on Clear Lake ahead of schedule.  Sod is another immediate gratification task, instant green.  We built two glacial stacked stone walls here as well.

30 Pallets of Green

Dirty Caleb, Summer Helper

Thought Joe Was Going Down, Just a Slip

Been a solid couple weeks got lots done, still have much to go.  Looking forward to 4th of July we will have friends visiting.  The nursery is developing nicely and is open seven days a week.  Seems to be selling a variety of goods, moving lots of mulch.  My time and Bruce's is spent in the field, with customers or doing paperwork.  We sure miss the benefits of having employees our grounds need lots of work, two mowing tractors are down and we still need to get plumbing the bathroom in the pole barn.