November 24: A Hardscape Redo Using Chat GPT

We started re-thinking the hardscape bed right outside our front door back in August. We fiddled around in Home Depot and Lowe’s, checked out designs shared on social media and websites, and thought of our own needs for a low-maintenance bedding design that will require less care than the one we just pulled out that had been there for 17 years. A Confederate Jasmine was running rampant, taking over the entire brick wall out front and serving as a nesting ground for birds. The one shrub we left was a gardenia bush just because I love the smell wafting by when I sit on the front porch reading in the late summer. I carefully dug up the Giant Elephant Ear bulbs to replant them in pots instead of the ground.

Once we finally decided on the rock we wanted to use, we set off to Lowe’s with the truck and trailer to get two pallets. Little did we know that it would not go as far as we thought it would. Our entire budget for this project covered only a third of the bed. We reconsidered using pine straw for budget purposes, but decided ultimately that the bugs it brings to the foundation (and Copperheads love it, too) was not in line with our original decision, so we went back to the drawing board.

Ultimately, we will have a black and white hardscape design with evergreen shrubs in pots, along with several gray hardscape boulders. We like the straight lines rather than the waves, but we are considering a curved line to account for the additional white rock we will have to purchase to make the straight line work.

Chat doesn’t understand that our sidewalk runs in a different direction, but it does understand that we needed to see the concept of the design. We’ve decided on small black polished river rock to finish the bed, and we will work to that end…….meanwhile, we will have to re-vamp the budget and decide when to add the additional features.

For today, we have a half-finished hardscape and high hopes we can get it finished before the landscape fabric blows away!

And here’s a blooper to end the day on……just for giggles. Chat GPT has the driveway going completely in the wrong direction and added grass in the hardscape bed. At least it shows us how badly we can goof up if we try hard enough.