A lawn again?

CleanSteve is away in Dorset and Devon for a couple of days. After he left this afternoon, I made a big lunch then set to work in the garden, shifting heavy barrowloads of soil and moving nettles and brambles. I wore my thickest fleece, outdoor trousers, socks and gardening gloves. The temperature was in the 20s, but I moved most of it before peeling everything off and enjoying a cooling bath.

The story is that CleanSteve and various friends started making raised beds some years ago, and transported lots of soil on tarps over to the 'lawn' side of the garden. Somehow it got left there, and weeds grew over it, then ivy and stuff from the garden next door invaded, and eventually we did not have a lawn/lying area but a jungle. We've been working hard to reclaim some of the garden, and this week have focussed on moving the surplus soil over to the fence on the other side of the garden. CleanSteve had a giant bonfire, but already we have the makings of another one.

It is my fervent hope we will have a lawn again. Not a perfect one, just a bit of green space, that I can lie on or friends' children can play on.

Compare this shot with Monday's collage, if you will. Of course they weren't taken from the same angle, but progress is being made. Even I can see it!