Sacha wrote:
Careful with decking, if I may butt in - it gets mossy and slippery in
the rain and heaven knows we get enough of that. Weeds and grass can
grow up through it unless concrete is laid first and - shudder - rats
and mice love picking up any food dropped through it or from it.
Personally, I'd consider flagstones with little pockets of earth left
between them for planting low growing things. But all that is very
much a matter of personal taste. Decking isn't always the answer to a
sitting area, though.

I got outvoted with our summer house front, where what you are suggesting
would have been nice, but He wanted decking. So we got decking.

Tbh, it's not that bad. It cleans off nicely with a power hose, and we've
not had any moss growing on it. It did have to get weedkillered at one
point cos the weed blanket under it wasn't doing its job. But now it seems
to be fine. (In fact, if /only/ the grass would grow! The garden looks
worse than Wembley!)

And yes, we did have rats living under it for a while. :-( But that's more
to do with the chickens nearby rather than food scraps under the decking, I
think. (Although I could be wrong)