Making Calculations

After visiting the allotment yesterday, and still thinking about re-edging the beds, the evening was spent working out my rustic (to say the least) calculations.  It turns out I need at least 30 metres worth of edging to replace the old rotting planks, plus some stakes to hold it in place.

After working this out, I spent the evening checking out Pinterest, eBay and B&Q/Wickes websites to see if I could find any reasonably priced solutions.  The outlook was a bit depressing and very expensive, so I went to bed not having progressed much further.

The following day, I decided to call in at B&Q on my way home from the gym, to see what they had in store. I found a few examples of treated timber I could buy that would do the job and for not too much over £50, there were options available which perked me up a bit.

I did purchase these two decking squares whilst in there, on clearance for £2 each, as I want to use them as a small platform/deck area under the tree on my plot.  I'm going to treat them first though to extend their life a little.  They don't actually match colourwise as they were the only two left, but I'm not too bothered as a couple of weeks of being outside and you probably won't even notice.

When I got home and told OH of my findings he handed me his SELCO brochure, in which similar timber was for sale much cheaper (almost half the price of B&Q) and he even offered to buy it for me this coming weekend which was very kind of him.  (I can't afford to buy it myself until next month).

I can see a lot of wood painting with preservative taking place in my immediate future.  I'm going to make some stakes from some longer lengths of wood and drop them in a bucket of preservative and then attach them to the planks before taking them to the plot, so that all I need to do is hammer them in place when I get there and I don't need to mess about with nails/screws/drills on site.

I'm now feeling a lot better about the task in hand, in fact I'm quite looking forward to getting on with it and am hoping to get it completed before the growing season starts proper.  I'll keep you posted as to progress.