Pond Project....Phase 1

Forgive the silence....vacation was calling. But now it's back to reality. In the previous post, I alluded to the fact that our latest project involved 1,500 lbs of stone. I'm not lying. 

Let me back up for a second...we have this awkward garden bed next to our screened in porch. It's a strange square-ish (I say "square-ish" because it's not to proportion). It was HATE at first sight. It's random, has VERY minimal plants (per the previous owners) and was lined with brick. Yuck, yuck and yuck. 

This was what the garden bed looked like last summer. 

We planted a hydrangea and put some herbs in the large blue pot. What to do with this garden bed.....hhhmmm?

The hubs and I have always wanted to have a small pond in our yard. My family had one growing up and it was fun to feed the fish and was a great focal point in the yard. Problem solved. Our random garden bed was the perfect spot for one.

So we laid out the garden hose in the shape we liked and started digging...

And digging...

Digging this hole was not easy at all. We have A LOT of clay in our soil which is very dense making it near impossible to dig up. We also ran into numerous large roots that we had to chop out. 

 (A perfect project for the hubs to wear his duck boots...duh)

Several hours later, sore backs and a few (bleeps), 
we were finished digging.

A few days later we had an afternoon of heavy rain....
which resulted in this...

Please excuse the poor picture. 
We had a GIANT muddy hole. Not exactly the pond we had in mind :(

Next up was to get some stone for the border of the pond. So off we go to the garden center to purchase a 1/2 pallet of stone. 
Hello 1,500 lbs of stone. 

So how are we supposed to get this home? Delivery was out of the question because that fee was the cost of the stone. We couldn't justify that. Our only option....loading the stone into the back of our car. Not kidding.

Here is the back of our Jeep loaded with stone. It took us 3 trips (a special thanks to my in-laws for helping!) to get all this home. Oh, and don't mind the wiffle bat. The hubs is a kid-at-heart so we are always prepared for an impromptu game of wiffle ball!

Phase 1 of the "Pond Project" complete. Stay tuned for phase 2!