Instant Gratification

The trouble with seeds is you have to sit around and wait for them to grow. And we have waited long enough! So we took the easy way out for perhaps the first time since starting our landscaping project and purchased the bigger, better version: SOD. It just so happened that the day it was delivered (and you have to install it immediately) happened to be the only day I have lived here where it was nearly 100 degrees. It was a miserable 6 hours spent on hands and knees. But that is an ancient forgotten memory every time I gaze upon our bee-you-tee-ful yard. What a difference a day makes!

We figured, why stop there? So we went hog wild at the nursery and bought a bunch of flowers, ornamental grasses (my favorite), bushes, and trees to install in the flower bed. I thought we would wait til next spring, but the ants arrived in the pants early. It happens. Our very nice neighbor George even brought us a 'yard warming' plant to put it the garden. It is the big broad- leafed tropical-looking one in the back. I love it! And just FYI, we don't tell Lowrider to pose when we're taking pictures. He is simply a camera hog.

We still had a few sections of bare dirt where we didn't put grass, like along the driveway and under the evergreen bushes in the front, so I picked out some rock (appropriately called "ginger rock"--most of you know why that's funny) to fill in the space. We used leftover flagstones to build a path up to the gate and behind the house.

The almost final touches have included some solar lights, a flowering plum tree, some big old flower pots, tiki torches, a patio heater, and a wireless speaker. To celebrate the very near completion of our yard, we held an inaugural grill christening, where Derek used his monstrosity of a grill for the very first time. We made burgers, drank Octoberfest, and tried out some homemade baked beans. YUM!

Progress!!! Patios, pergolas, and planting...

It's been awhile since we last chatted, and many developments have unfolded over the course of the summer. Let me start by saying we are so flippin' sick of yardwork.

First, allow me to unveil our new patio! We laid multi-color flagstone, which caused me to throw my back out and Derek to spend hours on his hands and knees with a rubber mallet trying to level the gosh-darn things so they didn't turn into teeter totters when stepped upon. (I'm trying hard not to use expletives to describe the experience). It was totally worth it. :) Bonding sand might be the coolest landscape material ever.



Derek also built me a lovely pergola, of our own design, that will hopefully be covered in climbing roses by next summer. (Use a little imagination here.) We already tucked Derek's new grill underneath to get us excited.


Next, we revamped all 4 of our very uncoordinated fences. We stained the new wood fence, painted the old wood fence, covered the tall chain link with reeds, and covered (well, eventually) the short chain link with ivy. They are still uncoordinated, but at least they are transformed into something less hideous. And each transformation cost less than $100. Which makes it all that much more beautiful! I heart the before and after pictures. Even Lowrider approves of our handiwork. :)




Then Derek decided we needed to install sprinklers. I will bite my tongue, but let's just say the sprinkler folks did not accept credit cards and in exchange we forfeited eating for the first 2 weeks of September. (Slight overexaggeration here, but ONLY slight.)

To keep ourselves from crying about our sad finances (we're wedding planning too, you know), we went shopping for some landscape plants. At least that way, having functioning sprinklers would be warranted. Except the sprinklers don't reach the planting beds... To prevent absolute depression, we tilled amendments into the soil that will nurture our future lawn, for which the sprinklers were truly installed, with the yet unfulfilled dream of one day having grass in our yard at the forefront of our thoughts.

I am proud to say I single handedly transplanted (instead of just chopping down) the out-of-place evergreen shrub originally in front of our house and replaced it with a little tiny white rose bush. Considering I hacked off half the shrub's roots while trying to dig it up and it is not the season to be planting roses, I'll be lucky if either one survives until spring. Oh well. It felt good. The little rose has some catching up to do...



We have a fairly short to-do list left (at least relatively speaking) pertaining to landscaping. We are planning to install sod next weekend, which is when the real transformation occurs. I have a couple trees I'd like to plant, and Derek is building a second pergola to balance the first. That's pretty much it besides adding some annuals next spring! Now, we need to paint the exterior of the house, replace the windows, and install a furnace. That, my friends, we am saving for a different rainy day (i.e. when our credit cards are paid off and our saving accounts are repopulated). Don't hold your breath. :) Cheers!!!

Developments

It's been awhile since we've updated our home improvements, but fear not. We've been working hard! (And paying others to work hard too.) Recent developments shown here:
The driveway and sidewalk stained dark grey.

Derek set pergola posts, the first step in our patio construction project! I edged off the tree. It only took like 3 hours for me to complete. Turns out carpentry isn't my strong point. I toasted our labors with a glass of wine (see shadow pic).
Last but not least, we have a new fence! We'll be using our engineering skills to disguise the other fence sections, but this one was a lost cause, so we just replaced it.

Next: patio. Then: sod? It's about darn time.

Visible Progress!!!

Well looky there! We actually built something this weekend! We put in a dry stack retaining wall for a future raised flower bed and a little area on the side for an herb garden. It is really really fun to actually see something take shape instead of just shoveling dirt and pulling weeds! Next weekend the fence...???

Someone stole the bathtub

I shit you not. Someone came between 2-3 am and stole the bathtub out of our yard. Derek woke up because he heard something and looked out the window in time to see a large unidentified object being loaded into a truck. I don't know if this is a blessing or a warning... At least we don't have to take it to the dump... And we'll be putting up that fence as soon as possible...

Deconstruct to Reconstruct

We figured the rest of the work we planned to do we could accomplish ourselves without the help of contractors or slaves. We're smart, fearless, and have plenty of ingenuity, right? Boy were we in for a treat when we decided to strip our yard of all vegetation in order to lay down new sod. We'll start for fun with the "before" photos of our weedsome lawn:



We rented a sod cutter and a Uhaul pickup truck to transport the sod cutter. Cutting sod is not quite as easy as it looks in commercials, but it's not impossible. And Derek thinks it's fun to play with heavy machinery so I left him to it. I followed behind and rolled up the sod into nice, neat weed barrels that we stacked along the house. The following weekend we ripped up the remaining weeds along the edges by hand.



We were out of town to a wedding the following weekend, so it had been two weeks since we had actually cut sod. You can imagine what began to happen. The weeds started growing back! We made a quick trip to Lowe's yesterday for some Roundup. I dearly hope it is effective.

In the meantime, we started moving some dirt around to level the yard when Derek discovered that the previous owners had buried a sink in the backyard. Perhaps they didn't want to pay for a trip to the dump? I dug the dirt out of it, then Derek smashed it to little pieces with the sledge hammer so we could extract it from the ground. (See pile of broken ceramic pieces below.) Derek also found what he thought was another sink next to it. Upon further digging, we unearthed not a sink, but a whole intact bathtub. WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE?



At this point, we're thinking pretty hard about how to move forward. We will need to till up the whole yard to level it and lay down edging for where the garden beds and the patio will eventually go. We will probably need to till it up again when we add nutrients and fertilizer before laying sod. The tiller costs about $80 to rent each time. And every time we rent a tiller, we have to rent a pickup to haul the tiller. What we did next was perhaps a little impulsive. We bought a tiller. But we didn't just buy a tiller. We also bought a pickup truck.



I know, I know. But it costs money to have things hauled away (i.e. the bath tub and the sod rolls), it costs money to have things delivered (i.e. the tiller we just bought, our future sod, patio materials, etc.), and it costs money to rent a truck if you want to do it yourself. And what do you gain by being overcharged for these services? Nothing. I can think of 10 separate times we will need a pickup truck to do these types of things over the course of the summer. So I don't think it was really a rash decision. I think it was an efficient decision. Even a frugal decision! Clearly, I am still trying to convince myself of this or I wouldn't be trying to rationalize it to you. Regardless, we are now proud owners of a 2007 Chevy Colorado. Derek couldn't be happier.

We love sledge hammers

Here are the 2 storage sheds residing in our yard. The one in the front has a twin size bed frame built into it. The one in the back has no doors and could be blown down pretty easily by the Big Bad Wolf. Both have a sketchy past.



We sledged, clawed, and crowbarred the sheds down. Then we busted out the Sawzall to dismember the 95% dead olive tree. It was a fun day.



Then we hired some locals with a big truck to haul away the debris.