Outside Catification Project
This week, we had someone come in to net off and catify one side of our house. It's the blind side of the house and has all the services as well as leftover roof tiles here. It was the perfect opportunity to tidy it up.
This is about as tidy as it's been for the last 15 years.
See that little 'ditch' by the side of the fence? Well....I dug out some of the sand that was there and filled it up with some garden soil. It's not very deep; but I planted some mondo grass and herbs there. We have garden mint currently growing in the sand and I figure that I might as well try some camomile as well. I'm hoping to seed some catnip in that area. And cat mint; if I can find some.
The paving down this side of the garden was a weekend job. We did it about 15 years ago and when we ran out of bricks, we dumped the rest of the sand in this section. It's a natural cat 'pit'. That fresh sand? I emptied out DS' sand pit from under the cubby house. He's long outgrown the sand pit and it was great to be able to repurpose the sand for a good cause.
It took 2 days for the man we hired to complete this job. The biggest amount of work was in the paling fence. It needed to be fixed up and the gaps all closed up. He also cut away all the overhanging bushes from the neighbour's garden.
The metal poles might not look great but they raise the enclosure up to a minimum height of 2 meters. We also got a metal gate frame to close this section up.
The net is a low visibility net and it really is quite unobtrusive. I have to look hard from the front to spot it.
We had a dead apricot tree in the backyard. We repurposed as much as the trunk as possible to make natural scratching and jumping posts for the cats.
And our bengal cat? Well! She took to the area with squeals of delight.
Although.....with the light rain this morning, she completely chose to stay indoors instead of heading out after breakfast!
I also bought some small planters and have cat grass and more herbs growing. I also got a small bamboo plant and a dwarf lemon plant. I need to head out to the garden shop to get more potting mix today so I can finish the pots! We might get a water feature in here as well but will need to get an electrician in first to put in an extra power point. And a outdoor table and 2 chairs would be nice in here as well. And DH is considering bricking up that sand pit so that it is neater. And I would like to put some ground cover in that back section....And that old laundry cabinet is full of firewood we need to empty out this winter. After that, we'll probably move the cabinet out of here....and get something that will keep the cats undercover for when it rains....and...and....
Aside from that, it's pretty much done now.

