Dizzy,

My first thought is why are the water lines so close to the surface and is that going to be a problem with freezing in the future? Are these sprinkler lines or the water main? I would not set the beds over the lines as at some point, you may spring a leak and you don't want to have to destroy all your hard work to repair it.

As far as going big, 32" height, I love it! Way to plan for the future! It will be more work now, but less work in the future, when you're older and maybe less inclined to take on big projects. I'd skip the rock. You could start at the bottom with lasagna style layers. When that's in place, buy a dump-truck load of the best compost/top soil mix you can find. Go to several soil/rock yard and check it out first, so you don't end up with junk soil. This will cost a couple hundred dollars and you'll probably need more soil than you think. I think delivery cost for a load of rock we got last year was $85, just to give you an idea of cost. Do you have room/access to have it delivered close to the backyard or would it have to be dumped on your driveway?

Lastly, all of this is moot if your dog is going to destroy it. I have a digger, too and it's taken several years of training to get a handle on it. We have access to oil field/pasture land and a 30 minute run each day solved most of our problems with him. Boxers are wonderful dogs, smart and energetic, so they need exercise and jobs to do to keep them out of mischief.

What a fun project!

Barb

"My first thought is why are the water lines so close to the surface and is that going to be a problem with freezing in the future? Are these sprinkler lines or the water main? I would not set the beds over the lines as at some point, you may spring a leak and you don't want to have to destroy all your hard work to repair it."

Let me clarify, they ran sprinkler lines a few inches under the existing garden. They connected them to a faucet on the back of the house so they could easily turn the faucet on for a few minutes to water everything. We have an automatic system, and I can tap into it fairly easily. I'm going to remove all the old stuff (it's mostly metal pipes) and run PVC a little deeper.

"Do you have room/access to have it delivered close to the backyard or would it have to be dumped on your driveway?"

Right now our driveway runs through our backyard. I hate it, way too much concrete. Result is that we never use our garage to park our cars, it's a wood shop right now ;) The upside is that we have a HUGE gate, and a dump truck can dump the soil on the driveway which is right next to the garden :)

Any recommendations/links on good lasagna layers to use?

Thanks for clarifying on the water lines. Kudo's to the previous owner for doing that. You'll be very happy to be able to get the soil close to the beds. For lasgna beds, I'm thinking a layer of cardboard or newspaper at the bottom, then sticks, leaves, grass clippings, horse, cow or chicken manure, kitchen scraps, anything without weed seeds that'll break down to start filling up the beds. My thought was to put the lasagna layers on the bottom and when you're out of materials, add good garden soil over the top. That way maybe you'd have enough soil in the root zone to go ahead and start planting and the lower layers can break down over time. But you can do the reverse, too, starting with good soil on the bottom and layers on top, depending on how soon you'd like to plant. I'm including a link below with some good general information.

Lasagna Gardening

just like you, I thought of building tall raised beds. I then had 33 inch raised beds built. i agree with not using rocks as a base. your raised bed is nothing but an extension of the ground below. with the exception of the tomatoes, which would grow too tall from this bed unless you are planning to let them sprawl. i'm growing my tomatoes in containers because i have a black walnut problem but you could grow them in the ground and have cages around them to keep the dog out. i'm hoping this set up will make gardening a lot easier