Finished boxes

I finally finished the flower boxes. The 2x12's were severely warped, which made the project more fun than normal. I also went for maximum utilization of reclaimed hardware, which meant that some of the bolts, nuts, and washers were extra fun to work with. The good thing is that I used all the 2x12's (4 of them), and only had to buy about $20 in bolt/nut/washer hardware to complete both boxes. I used 4 of the 8 4' 4x4's, each of which were cut into 3 pieces for the vertexes. This is what a naked box ended up looking like (the second one).

We put the first box in the corner of the yard. Amy worked hard preparing the soil for the box, which involved hand-tilling up the clay soil, and excavating a perimeter for the box, along with cute tiny little post holes for the posts. We placed the box, then started filling it with a sampling of the soil treatment stuff I picked up from home depot. It was essentially the same stuff I used to clean out of the chicken coop when I was young, chicken manure and rice hulls. We topped it off with a special blend of potting soils. Here, you see Amy admiring the box, ready to receive its bounty of vegitation.

Here's the finished box, full of nutrient rich soil after an irrigation. If you could see through the fence, you'd see the squirrels on the other side holding hands and dancing in a circle, excited for this fresh new source of soft dirt to bury stuff in.