Casper didn’t help, but he did pose for the camera.

We had a round sandpit built into our brick hardscape for our girls. We built our hardscape in 2001 and our girls are now 15 and 16. It’s been a long time since they played in the sandbox. There is a thin layer of soil on top of the sand, and things that grow on sand had taken hold — like beach strawberries. Not a lot really thrives in sand.

Late last summer, I saw an article in the San Francisco Chronicle Home & Garden section about using a straw wattle (those things you see on slopes to control erosion) to create a cheap, easy raised bed. They’d arranged the straw wattle in a spiral: http://goo.gl/qZzjZX.  Something clicked.

I knew this was the answer to what to do with that old sand pit.

First, I had to get a straw wattle. This was cheap (about ($39) but not easy to find. The only Home Depot in the Bay area that had them was in San Leandro, on the other side of the Bay Bridge and quite a ways south. And it was even hard to find in the store. It is one of the least glamorous and bulkiest things they carry, so I had to get all kinds of special help to locate it back in the area with the forklifts. It totally filled the back of my car and left straw embedded in the carpet-like material back there. But when I got it into my back yard, my puli fell in love with it!

Casper enjoys hanging out in the straw wattle. It’s cozy.

Next, I had to clear out the sandpit. I started digging, and kept digging and digging, filling up every nearby pot and tub with sand, throwing sand into flowerbeds, etc. Then I realized I would have a lot of sand that needed to be hauled away, so I found some big plastic bags and started shoveling the sand into them. I recruited some help now and then, especially from my daughter Claire, but even when I didn’t have a helper, I always had an audience.

When the pit got deep enough to be fun to jump in and out of, my puli started getting more involved:

Casper didn’t help, but he did pose for the camera.

Finally, we got to the bottom of the sand. There was a black plastic cloth liner underneath. It was there to stop weeds from growing. I ended up with 10 x 2 cubic feet of sand to be hauled away and I tossed the black liner.

Then, I dragged the straw wattle over and wrapped it around the hole. It went around twice, perfectly.

Wrapping the straw wattle around the hole — it went around twice, perfectly.

Next, I poured 10 x 2 cu. feet of Sloat’s organic garden soil into the hole and the new raised bed. And voila!

Filling the pit and the raised part of the bed took about 10 bags of planting mix.