Wednesday, July 04, 2007

Independence Day

Our gray cottage would look even more natural if it had a few stone accents. Unfortunately, we're not masons; nor can we afford to hire masons! The cheapest way for us to add a touch of stone was to build a small dry stacked wall in front of our entry.

We've been gathering local rocks whenever we can find them free. We still need enough for another two layers, so the wall becomes visible from the street. After that, I'll plant white annuals behind the wall for impact.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

It looks lovely. Too bad you don't live closer -- I have 81 acres of rocks, from pebbles to massive glacier boulders!

Kelly said...

What a cute idea! I love it.

Mary in MN said...

Meredith,

I love, love, love your red door! Our entire house is going to be painted a barn red and I would like to paint the door something different (other than the white it's painted now).

Happy 4th of July!

Anonymous said...

I think that rock wall you are building looks just right! I love that you've found the rocks for free even more! Looks great!

sheila from life @ #17 said...

that flag just looks so good right where you placed it :)

and lovin' the stacked stone wall...

Anonymous said...

We put stacked stone walls around our flower beds last year. Lots of work to gather the rocks. We live in an area of Texas where rocks are easy to come by, so the rocks were free. We did use some masonary glue to keep them in place. It comes in a tube like caulk and is not too expensive. It works well when we get heavy rain with flowing water to keep the rocks form washing away. We had fun building it too. Like putting a puzzle together. Ours are really large as we can get a truck load of rocks from my son's property any time we feel like loading them.
Your home is very charming. I love the red, white, and blue table setting. Your family must be very proud of you.
Roxie

TracyMichele said...

I love the stone work. It is an inexpensive way to landscape. We have many new developments being built in our area so when I see them blasting, I stop and ask if we can come by and load up rocks for our yard (they rarely say no). DH and I have built a raised bed and made 2 rock pathways in the yard. Our neighbor has build an entire stone wall this way!

Emmy said...

I love stacked stone wall too! We have completed several with stone that was surrounding a pond we filled in to my husband hauling home free rocks 2-3 times a week the first 6 months he was home w/ our newborn. It IS like a puzzle and we both love the results. Your's looks great, can't wait to see it get taller.
Emmy in Nashville

Alexandra said...

We've done the same only with broken concrete in naturalistic shapes. Sound awful, but looks nice actually.

We did a small dry river bed in the front with a mix of found rocks and bags of pea gravel and egg stones from Lowes. Heh, I should blog about that! ;)

It would obscure the rocks, but I bet tall daylilies would look really nice in that spot...the height would give the area a bit of proportion with the stairs behind it. The only problem is, you have to find a species which is a long bloomer. I guess annuals are easier to change out so you always have color there.