I’m really not kidding… this arbor took a mere hour to make! It is nothing fancy as you can see but hopefully it will serve it’s purpose and provide a place for my favorite vine (honeysuckle) to climb to it’s heart’s content!
This summer during a storm, my twig arbor blew over. This had happened once before and I was able to fix it, but this time it broke into pieces and wasn’t salvageable. I’ve come to see that although there is a beauty to using natural wood out of the forest to build things, it has a life span of about four years or so.
For a few months there was no arbor here and it bugged me every time I walked past. I mulled over it a while on what I could use to build another arbor.
Right now my supply of wood isn’t so great and I didn’t want to use branches again. I remembered seeing some old screen doors in the shop attic.
For me, there’s something about seeing a garden through a screen door…
I climbed the ladder and pulled myself into the sultry, hot attic. As I swung up it crossed my mind what would happen should the ladder fall? Would anyone ever find me? Would it have been worth it.. climbing up there for a couple of old, torn screen doors? As I balanced myself on trusses and shimmied along, being careful not to step on the plywood ceiling, I forgot about the ladder falling and thought the heat might get me first. I still seriously wonder what the temperature was. Anyway, needless to say, after much sweating and pulling and carefully lowering myself down into what felt like Antarctica again, I had my doors.
I sorted through some of my oldest looking boards and used those for the top.
After about thirty screws later and a few braces… there it was…
Speaking of screws, lately every time I wanted to build something, I found myself rummaging about for the right sized screw, which is a pain if your in a hurry. I remember mentioning this to hubby, that one of these days when I’m in the hardware I want to get some screws. I didn’t give it another thought. The other day he was to a local lumberyard to get a few pieces of lumber and came home with thirty pounds of screws, three different sizes!! A memorable day for me, to say the least!
I stapled a few of the vines to help them climb.
I did hammer two stakes into the ground and fastened the door to them to keep the arbor from tipping over.
So before tossing out a worn out old screen door, think of what it could add to your garden!
Thanks for visiting!
-Mary
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