Gardening/Yard Care

When we bought our house in 2023, the yard was in pretty rough shape. The previous owners had neglected it, letting weeds take over the whole lawn and much of the surrounding area. There was trash and broken glass throughout. The only things planted in the ground were a couple of dead trees, and the backyard was bracketed by a rusty chainlink fence on one side and a crumbling wood fence on the other.

Through a ton of hard work, we’ve brought it from “rough” to “presentable” and are slowly working toward “actually good”. While the first few years skewed more toward clean-up and yard work/maintenance, I am hoping the next few skew more toward gardening and beautification. I think it’ll be a while before I’m really satisfied with it, but I’m proud of the progress we’ve made so far.

While the other pages on this site are focused on sharing finished work, this page is more about the journey. It shows what things looked like when we started, how they look today, and all of the intermediate changes we’ve made in between. My goal is to keep updating it as we continue making improvements over time!

Starting Point (March 2023)

Front yard. Minimal grass, mostly weeds. Decaying flower box.

Backyard. Overgrown weeds across the lawn and covering the concrete walkway.

Backyard. Weeds growing into the heat pump and house siding.

Backyard. Old clothesline post.

Year 1 (2023)

Added vinyl fence around the backyard and side yard (May 2023).*

Added window wells, a crawl space door, a better drainage system, and grading around the foundation of the house (July 2023).*

Pop up drain emitter (July 2023).*

Crawl space access well and door (July 2023).*

Regular mowing and weed whacking started to improve the appearance of the lawn, but it’s still heavily overgrown with weeds and not enough grass (October 2023).

Planted our first shrub, an Azalea bush (October 2023).

Removed old clothesline post (December 2023).

Year 2 (2024)

Before: added a stepping stone walkway along the side of the house (February 2024).

After: added a stepping stone walkway along the side of the house (February 2024).

The Azalea bush bloomed really nicely (April 2024).

Regular maintenance continued to improve the appearance of the lawn; increasingly more real grass and less weeds (April 2024).

Mulched along the sides of the shed to help control weeds (June 2024).

Added string lights around the fence (July 2024).

Started adding in-ground beds around the perimeter of the backyard (July 2024).

Continued adding in-ground beds around the perimeter of the backyard; planted some Phlox (August 2024).

Phlox bloomed nicely (September 2024).

Planted some Black-eyed Susans (September 2024).

Planted some Asters in the front (September 2024).

Removed the decaying flower box in the front yard and replaced it with an in-ground bed; planted some Boxwood and Juniper shrubs in it (October 2024).