Hitting the Deck

When we lived in Boston’s hip South End, our private 600 square foot roof deck was a sanctuary in the city, perfect for getting a suntan above the hustle and bustle below. Basil, tomato plants, and sunflowers thrived – until they were mercilessly eaten by squirrels who scoffed at the metal pie plates I strung up in an effort to deter them.

When we moved a few miles away from downtown, we went from this lovely view
to this

A little different, huh? This photo is from when moved in last September. Thanks to a complete lack of evergreens, in the early spring things looked pretty bleak:
On the right, you can see a pile of brick pavers. The previous owners had about 80 left over from building the patio, and instead of getting rid of them, they attempted to build a little path (which they never finished), and left the rest strewn around. So I dug them all up and a colleague carted them away so her mom could use them to build a fire pit. Everyone was happy! If this was our forever home, I would have ripped up all of the pavers and rebuilt the whole thing with flagstone.

As spring progressed, I discovered a random set of perennials planted by our predecessors (say that five times fast). With limited gardening skills, I slowly spruced things up with annuals:

and basil, rosemary, and flat-leaf parsley:
No amount of planting, however, could make up for the eyesore that was the deck:
The potential for storage space was huge, so  I commissioned my super-talented dad to build an enclosure and finish the stairs. After a lot of hard work and a fresh coat of stain over the whole deck, we now have something much more useful and easier on the eyes:

Except it’s orange. Yeah….apparently “redwood” isn’t really dark red, like it looked on the sample in the store. I seriously hope that it darkens over time.

There’s still a lot of potential for our little deck and little yard, which includes replacing this horrendous plastic patio set…

…with one more like this:

Meridian Patio Set - Crate & Barrel

I am keeping my fingers crossed that it goes on sale soon!