I was afflicted with all of those things yesterday afternoon while Patrick & I continued the quest to tame our backyard. It's like Man vs. Wild out there. Sort of. I mean, we didn't have to build our own raft out of twigs or eat grubs or anything, but you know, it's pretty savage. That was my first ever bee sting - it hurt! We spent all afternoon clearing weeds from the center of the yard, putting down weed blocking cloth, then covering it with gravel (crushed granite). 
The resulting neat and clean, finished-looking garden path looks great! We will be giving the narrow paths that cut between the flower beds the same treatment eventually. Side note: You might remember those flower pots from this post a while back. I'm sad to say that they have not fared well in this summer's drought. Or to be more blunt, everything in them has died except for the sedums in the second pot! {Note to self: plant more sedums in the other pots.} However, looking on the bright side, the cacti cuttings we took from my parents' house are doing extremely well, and the Mother of Thousands is living up to her name.
This is what the area looked like right after we cleared the weeds. I neglected to get a picture of the weediness, but just look at that area around the bbq pit there; it was pretty much like that, very green and lush since our record-breaking drought has finally come to an end, but all weeds. And it's now pretty much all mud too, since we had a torrential downpour on Saturday. Our goal is to minimize the yard (or the mud & the weeds, that is) by making big flower beds with paths in-between, and only having a small side yard on the right. We plan to seed that with Turffalo someday.
This is the view looking back at the house, where Patrick is extending our patio with antique Chicago bricks he found on Craig's List. It's going to look so cool, and be quite useful, too. Please ignore that pea soup in the pond - we're still working on that.This kind of stuff sure is hard work, but it definitely gives you a feeling of pride and accomplishment. Just look at what we were up against when we bought the place last December:
What the heck was going on with all of those pavers?!! We're still trying to figure that out. But hey, they've made great path edging and a retaining wall for our compost pile in the back!
Posts
