New Look to Alley Grass

Lisa L Hall
by Lisa L Hall
2 Materials
$300
4 Days
Medium

For anyone who lives in the south, we have alley access to our garages. Why builders would waste the money to put in drip lines in this small area, much less grass, is beyond me. After years of mowing and watering this tiny area, I had an idea.


So I began by pulling up all of the grass and drip lines. I waited until winter to do a lot of the work since having the ground wet help with pulling up the dormant grass.


As I was pulling up the drip line, I decided to leave just a bit of it in the event the people who buy the home when we move, would want to put plants back into the area.


The result was as I hoped and now I don't have to worry about mowing, edging or the waste of water for this area.


This was a bit on the expensive side due to the river rock I used. I'm sure there are less expensive rocks that can be used. Our HOA is a bit touchy on what they will approve so I needed to use the river rock. (next home...no HOA. Ha ha)


The only expense I had was the bags of rocks. Each bag was approximated $3.50 and I used 30 bags so roughly $300.00.

Step one...remove grass


This is part of the section that needed to be removed. The removal was the hardest part and took the longest.

step 2


Once I got everything cleared out, I did spray the entire area with weed and grass killer. Due to the area butting directly up to the alley concrete I did not put down a weed barrier sheet. It is hard to see but there is a slight slope to the area and I would have needed to dig out at least 1/2 of all of the dirt. So I opted to use the spray instead.


If you want to really keep the weeds out, use the barrier.

Step 3


I used pea pebbles and river rock so I would achieve the look I wanted. You don't need to use two different types.


If you can get these delivered, I would highly suggest it.

Adding the rock


This is two bags worth. The rock laying went quicker than I thought it would.

two bags spread out


This is the area that two bags covered in my area. I did start adding larger rocks for the longer strip and especially by my pool overflow drain.

finished


This is the final result. It took longer than I wanted but weather was an issue.

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  • Nanci Nanci on Apr 11, 2020

    We built a side walk down one side of our house with patio blocks. Then put pea gravel down both side of the rock Which we purchased by the pickup load — much cheaper. That was 7 years ago. Still looks great. Better than the strip of wet grass when it rained.

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