Urbanite= reused concrete

We need to create walkways around the buildings. Dirt paths are, well, dirty. Crushed rock or mulch are hard to deal with in the winter. Natural stone is cost-prohibitive. Concrete sidewalks are resource-intensive. But what if we could reuse pieces of old concrete sidewalks and bed them in sand like stone pavers? After finding a pile of concrete somebody had dumped along one of my running trails (it pays to be a trail runner!), I decided to find out. So I brought back two pickup loads of concrete chunks and two more of sand, then landscaped the front entry of our house to see how the "Urbanite" would look...we like it, what do you think?

With the temperatures FINALLY warming up enough to paint again, I used some to turn the entry door into a faux barn door. Now if I could just finish the silo.

Horse turds, anyone?

Our friends in Aurora offered up a load of manure, so I filled up the truck. I also built a compost bin so we can start making our own good stuff for next year. With the gardens covered with a layer of fermenting horse turds, it suddenly smells like a real farm around here.

My parents came over for a few days to hang drywall. We got most of the flatwork done, so next is the curved surfaces of the silo and barn ceiling. Good times!

Our goal in landscaping the new barn centers around making the ground productive rather than consumptive- rather than cover the ground with turf that requires mowing, watering, and weed-killers, we'd prefer to utilize the space for growing things worthwhile. We'll plant gardens and drought-resistant plants, install pervious pathways, and collect rainwater for our irrigation needs. This week's project was gardening, or at least preparing for gardening. I built four raised bed gardens for the south side of the barn and also the stand to hold 10 rain barrels. Eventually, the rain gutters will discharge into the rain barrels and the water will be gravity fed to each of the raised beds for plant watering. But first we need rain gutters, downspouts, piping, several more rain barrels and of course dirt(!) to make all this work as planned....