Over the years we've had countless discussions around the kitchen table with my parents talking about house and garden design. They're good at it - Dad was a draftsmen and wannabe architect (next life) and Mum always had amazing ideas as well. Their garden is stunning - partly as they've always had the money to put into it, and partly that they're good at design and enjoy the process as well as the fruits of their labour, enjoying the garden. Even in his decrepit state, Dad'll occasionally go out and pull a weed or two.

Last weekend we went and had fish and chips at my folks and talked about building a pergola outside the loungeroom door. We're about to build a deck that will cover the up old slab that extends toward the veggie patch, which is so bloody horrible and ugly that I'm so stoked we are finally doing it. Here's a drone shot so you get the sense of what we'll be doing. We've already moved the rocks that form the semi circle to the right.

Our big problem is shade, especially in summer, but to build a pergola out the back door presents two problems - one, if we have shade we don't have a view of the sky, and two, if it's more of an open pergola (maybe with a grapevine in the summer) it'll cost a lot of money we don't have (especially after doing the deck.) I suppose we have two more points, thinking about it - it might look odd, and we already have a gazebo - quite a large area that's sheltered from the rain and sun. We've utilised that spot a bit, but not as much as we'd like.

So as we chatted, flicking through Green magazines (we love the aesthetic of this mag in particular) we realised what we needed to do (because the most ideal scenario is expensive and difficult) is connect the gazebo to the back door in a more inviting way, and change the space so it felt good to be in there.

The first step was making the path that led to the gazebo more straightforward from the back deck, instead of curving. We'd widen it, scrape the cheap gravel from the underneath of the gazebo, and put new toppings down. We decided on Tuscan topping as it's much warmer (though it's more expensive). As you can see in the below drone shot, the yellow line will be the pathway to the gazebo from the back door.

Perhaps it's a little clearer here, at least the back slab anyway. It's been a functional enough space but that little decking is not much use and the slab is cold, grubby and ugly.

We moved some rocks from the garden where the deck's going to be so we could line the path all the way down, with bigger rocks to help prevent the mulch being kicked out by birds (and sometimes, escaping chickens - grrr).

We'll also create some kind of screen or walls to enclose it a little more from the wind. The whole point is to make it as inviting as possible, so it feels natural to move from the back door toward the shelter of the gazebo.

I mean, the crazy thing is, no matter what we do, it'll be 'better than it was' - have a look at this, where we first moved into the house! When we got rid of the trampoline, the hole that was left was called the 'pit of despair'.

Good on Jamie for all the hard labour though - with my hip the way it is, I just can't shovel gravel at all! I am seeing the physio though, so I'll be back at the hard stuff soon enough (I hope!) but for now, I'm just supervising.

We really like transforming spaces. There's more to do yet - we want to dig a deeper pond and there's plants to plant. I have a dream of a natural swimming pool but I doubt very much we'd ever have the time or money to do that. I'd love to paint a mural on the bus too that forms a backdrop to the gazebo space. It's just a shame Dad won't ever see it - his days of driving over to our place are well and truly done.

What do you think of our plans? Are you renovating your own garden, or do you have plans to?

With Love,

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