Making a Yard

Although Jeff and I have lived in our house for nearly three years, updating the backyard has been an arduous process. It started out looking something like this, except completely covered in knee-high weeds:

So we had a sod rolling party! [Tip: do NOT get the cheap sod from Home Depot, Ace Hardware, etc. Find a reputable company in your area and invest in the high quality stuff. Our front yard (not the one shown here) was done with cheap sod, and it is so thin that weeds easily take over. You WILL end up spending much more in the end on turf builder and weed spray.]

Which also coincided with Willow's 1st birthday.

Funny story. When I asked the grocery store to write "Happy 1st Birthday Willow" on the cake, they assumed it was for a baby. So they also gave me one of those one-year-old cakes for free. You know the ones made specifically for the baby to destroy? Yeah so the lady at the bakery probably thought I was a trash ball because my cart was filled to the brim with beer, which was shortly topped with cake for a "little girl" named Willow. Class.

Even though we have worked hard over the years to get the rest of the yard put together, we just couldn't seem to tackle the weeds in the perimeter of the yard without additional help, especially since my pregnancy significantly held back my ability to do yard work this year. It seemed like every time we made progress, the weeds would be back by the time we were finished. Jeff's parents saw our need, and graciously made the trip up to Spokane to give us some helping hands. Jeff Sr is an animal! Anyone who knows him is aware of this fact, but I was still blown away. A task that would take me hours of backbreaking work was finished in a matter of minutes. AND this was accomplished weeks ago when it was 100+ degrees outside. Jeff's mom, a master gardener, was able to plant perennials that would complete our yard. Here is what they were able to accomplish in two days (I say "they" because I was mostly just getting in the way):

Before

After

After - those plant cages would soon house my thriving pumpkins and cucumbers

The brick border around the grass was also a great investment. Depending on how big your yard is, it could be upwards of $150 to cover the whole border, but it looks much better than plastic.

Jeff's mom planted the hydrangeas, azaleas, boxwood, and a few more shrubs I can't remember the names of. We planted the hostas last year, but you could barely see them underneath all the weeds (see before picture). The lavender was planted from seed 2 summers ago, and is now one of my favorite things about our house. Now the trashiness of our yard no longer matches the trashiness of our neighbor's fence!