The Garden Remodel is DONE!

For those of you who have been following this blog for a while, you’ll remember wayyyy back in early spring I began the Garden Remodel. For people who have recently stumbled upon this blog you can read about my garden woes here. Or just keep looking to see the horrors I endured.

Well, the Garden Remodel is FINALLY done. There’s a little more planting to do, but that’s always an ongoing project as I fall in and out of love with certain plants. Here we go…

First, we needed to do a little rearranging of the furniture. The table was moved from the middle of the yard to the patio area (we use it SO much more now) and the bench went to the side of the shed (this bit’s not very exciting, I promise you’ll be oohing and ahh-ing a bit further down).

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER

Then there was the mud pit in front of the shed. Ugly, ugly, ugly. We decided to put in a rock “pond” and have wooden Japanese-style steps going out over the “pond” that would eventually lead to some paths (to replace the muck).

BEFORE

 

FILLING IN THE POND

Since we were a bit sick of treading through mud every winter, we decided to dig out some areas and install paths and new beds to take over the areas where grass refused to grow. The first two pics below used to be the view from my dining room window (bleh!)

BEFORE

DIGGING OUT THE PATHS

AND HAULING IN THE GRAVEL (YAY FUN!)

Another spot for a path (this is the area to the right of the rock pond)

BEFORE

BUILDING A NEW BED

MORE GRAVEL (SUPER FUN!)

SAND OVER THE GRAVEL FOR THE STEPPING STONES

LAYING OUT THE STONES

AND FILLING IN WITH SOME FANCY PEA GRAVEL – it’s coated so it looks shiny!

PATH TO AND OVER THE ROCK POND

PATH, HOSTA AND ONE OF NEW ESPALIER TRELLISESJust in case you forgot how hideous the BEFORE was…

And AFTER

BEFORE

And AFTER (the new view out the dining room window – yay!) BEFORE (try not to vomit)

And AFTER…

SOOO, much better!

Hope you liked this!

UPDATES

• There’s a new web page in town…Going Native: Small Steps to a Healthy Garden now has its own page on this site where you’ll learn all about the book, find out about giveaways and contests and peruse the Table of Contents. I’ve just received the second proof and it looks fabulous – there were many picture issues in the first proof that n
• The official release date for Going Native is 20 September, but followers of this blog will have opportunities to win advance copies of the book…the first giveaway starts this weekend and there will be a contest next week to test your native plant identification skills! To stay informed, be sure to follow this blog.