Creating Mulch Garden along walkway?

scrape the top off, just deep enough to get roots. toss this around like tossing a salad to separate soil if you need it. digging down like you are saying is good, most won't take the time. if you put down the news paper, dig down a bit and put a THICK layer of mulch. depending how wide this is you may want to put the mulch very thick as much as 10". you can plant pots of poinsettia, easter lilly or what ever the season is. just dig a hole in the mulch to hide the pot. you will need to treat it like a potted plant and water by hand every day or two. water the pot not all around it.