Up until now our plan was to get rid of the concrete after cutting to make it easier for people to haul away. I had a new add posted on Kijiji for free cut concrete blocks to use for pathways or truck weights for winter. There were a few responses, though only one person came to get a few pieces to use for a shed base. One respondent and I were in contact for months about coming to get the pieces when the next Chinook came. Since there were few of those warming events this past winter, it was nearly March before it was possible to get the pieces out.
In the mean time, I became much more interested in permaculture and began taking classes with Verge Permaculture (see previous post about chop & drop) to earn a Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC). Since living in Oregon 3 years ago, where we became passionate about organic gardening, preserving food during peak seasons through canning and dehydrating, we have been wanting to do more on our property to assist our sustainability. Permaculture fit that desire... and lots more. It was truly a life changing course. Every other weekend from March through May (to fulfill the 72 hour requirement), I came home with my head swimming with ideas on how we could improve our property and life. Some ideas like installing a food forest (a combination of trees, shrubs, herbs, vines, and ground cover that all benefit each other) Tim was really excited about, whereas a composting toilet he was not so keen on.
As I talked with some of the permaculture experts in town and showed them pictures of our concrete jungle, they all said the same thing: "you have to keep that concrete!" I'm sorry, did you say "keep"?? We have been trying to get rid of it for months! Yes, it is true that our backyard gets several degrees warmer than any other lot around due to the concrete and our laundry dries within 1 hour of being hung out on a warm day.
"And just what do you propose I do with all of this cut concrete?" I would ask them. They had a variety of ideas, but the most practical one I remember was to make raised beds out of the pieces. As the PDC course continued, I drew new sketches of ideas for the backyard each weekend. None of the designs really stuck, it seemed that hands on was the only way to test our ideas. Concrete, as you may imagine, is not very forgiving!
Keeping in mind that our number one objective was to increase our food growing space, we kept thinking about what to do with the concrete for a few months.
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