Side Verandah Makeover: One Room Challenge - Week Two

I'm taking part in the One Room Challenge, a design event where 20 featured designers and countless guest participants transform a single space over 6 weeks.  If you missed last week, read about my plans for the side verandah here. Check out all the other great designs at the One Room Challenge blog.

Week two has been a fairly slow week for me, mostly because I spent 5 days of it traveling to and spending time in Canberra. I did get to spend half a day at Floriade, basking in the glories of multi-coloured tulips, but the rest of my tourism was firmly aimed at the child market.

Spectacular tulips at Canberra's Floriade

What progress have I made? 

As far as the actual work on the ground goes, I've patched concrete.  I know, intellectually, that this is a very important step, and the paint won't look as nice without the patching done, but it is not the most exciting visually. It also has an odd backwards quality, as part of the preparation to patch involves chiseling and widening the edges of the holes and cracks, to create a better surface to put the goop onto.  The goop in question is Turbo Concrete Bog, the only concrete patching option I could find at Bunnings that said it was suitable for outdoor use - most of them seemed to be aimed at garage floors and said indoor only. It appears to be made by a New Zealand company, so no idea what an equivalent would be for any readers from further afield.

I'm using this to patch the verandah's floor - find it at Bunnings here. 

When I started the first patch, I was incredibly intimidated, but it didn't take too long before I got the hang of it. I'm not getting the super smooth results a more experienced user undoubtedly could, but after a sand they don't look at all bad.

My two very first concrete patching efforts! Not perfect, but way better than cm deep holes

There are a few cracks near the very front edge of the verandah where I'm too scared to widen them, because I suspect large pieces of the edge would fall off, so they may remain unfilled, and there are two large holes near the verandah uprights where the holes are way too big to be a 'patch', especially as the front edge is missing entirely.  However filling 75% of the holes and cracks still leaves me with a 75% smoother floor, and I'm happy with that.

The other thing I've done this week is a lot of purchasing!

I made a decision about which stencil pattern I want to use for the floor.  I wanted to find one from an Australian supplier, and I found several tile stencils from Gemini Creative that I loved.  I ended up going with this design. I've reproduced the picture from the vendor's website, because it has a watermark and I feel that taking a big picture of her pattern without one would be dodgy.

Image of the stencil I've chosen, from the Gemini Creative online store

I made my final choice based partly on what would still let lots of the green show through - I was initially considering the reverse of this pattern, but decided it was too much paint added at the stencil stage.

I also bought a mixed 8 tube stock box from the Native Plant Project. While the majority of the plants are headed for elsewhere in the garden, two maidenhair ferns and a fan flower are intended for the verandah.

Tube stock of some new native plants for the verandah from the Native Plant Project's e-nursery

While I've set a fairly generous-for-me budget for this project, the truth is that a majority of it is already earmarked for paint. That's fair enough - the paint is the most permanent part of this revamp, and the part that has to last the longest. It does mean that I'm trying to save money elsewhere by haunting Facebook Marketplace.  This week I found a gorgeous, large plant pot that fits perfectly in my colour scheme for only $10, way less than new.  It comes with an as-yet-unidentified, possibly climbing, plant, which I'm still deciding if I will keep.

Isn't that bronzy coppery glaze perfect with my moodboard? 

What's up next?

I have to get through a few more days of school holidays, including my son's birthday party, and then when school starts next week I plan to get paint on concrete, start turning the cabinet into a potting bench, and source more pots.  The only thing that could mess up the plans would be rain, and given how much of NSW is in drought, that's a setback I'm happy to live with.