Following the Brick Road

So: true confessions time. Sometimes, I start huge random projects that really don't - on the face of it - need to be happening. (Psychoanalyze at will.) Case in point - there was nothing particularly horrible about the way the bricks were laid out in our back yard. Sure, they were in an awkwardly spaced basketweave pattern with almost an inch of dirt around each brick. And yes, that dirt would find its way up and out constantly, but would stubbornly refuse to grow moss on it.



But still, did I really need to pull up all the bricks and start over? Probably not. And yet, that is pretty much exactly what I did. Using all the awesomely patinaed bricks that were already there, plus an extra 60 or so free from Craigslist (because guess what? When you eliminate all the dirt space, you need extra bricks!), I went to town.

Here's a shot of the naturally occurring before and after effect of redoing everything row by row:



I started in March, and yesterday I finally finished. Phew! That is some ridiculously hard garden labor. But look how pretty and clean-looking it is now!





The original plan was to also uproot all the bricks in the way back area of the garden and make that a grass lawn... but that will have to wait until fall apparently, according to my quick research of when you're supposed to plant grass seeds. Any tips on making that process go smoothly?