House Before and After Pics: the Backyard

Sniff sniff...

This is my final Before/After Post!

And I post it with bittersweet feelings because....

...wait for it....

....we have an ACCEPTED OFFER ON OUR HOUSE!!!!

So, while it has been super fun and nostalgic and great to review all the work we put into making this house our home.  Now....NOW I get to grapple with OUR house being someone ELSE'S house.  I mean, I KNEW that day would come, right?  This IS what I was hoping for, right?  It was really hard to see them here today for the house inspection.  To watch other people walking around in MY house.  I'm sure it will be a little bit different when my stuff isn't in the house, and it is just a blank canvas again...but not too much different, I am sure.  I am sure there will be tears shed.  And you know what?  That is TOTALLY OK.

But, I digress...you are here to see the backyard transformation, no?

Let's start with the PATIO:

This was the back patio and back deck BEFORE.  Note the rotted deck and the overgrown landscaping.

 

Here's another view so you can really appreciate the state of condition the landscaping was in (if you could even call it that).

The view looking out into the backyard over the patio.

The overgrown vegetation (and the beautiful lamps)...

 

And here is what it looks like today!

This is a picture I took this spring when the phlox was blooming.  LOVE the carpet of purple...

The view of the patio from the second story deck above...

Another view from the deck...  See how all the landscape block is in straight rows?  Max SLAVED over digging up all the old block and relaying it.  It was a HUGE HUGE HUGE project, but one he undertook with minimal complaining.  And, just look at how beautiful it looks now!  It pays to do something right the first time!

View of the patio looking back at the house...  You can see the new deck, the plantings, and everything.

Moving on to the BACK YARD:

Shortly after we closed on the house, we had to have someone in to re-grade the yard.  The slope of the yard sloped too much towards the house rather than away, so they had to scrape a lot of dirt out and move it.  Rather than pay to have it hauled away, we relocated it to the back of the property to create a 'berm' to actually channel the water away from the house.  We live on a big hilled street and we are almost to the bottom...so a lot of the rain water from up the hill flows through our property.  This berm helps channel the majority of that water AWAY from the house.  But, it all had to be planted and landscaped as a result.

We planted everything ourselves.  Most of it was obtained 'bare root' from a local nursery.  It was fun to plan the landscaping and then literally get my hands dirty implementing it.  I love dirt.  :)

Mason likes it too...

Here's a view looking back at the berm.

And the back yard from the side view too...

Another shot of the landscaping...

The full back yard (we are on almost .75 acres...so the lot is pretty large.  You can see my apple trees in this picture too.  They produce AWESOME apples that are great for making apple sauce, apple butter, etc.

Moving on to .... the SIDE OF THE HOUSE:

Here is the side of the house (the north side).  This was pre-grading.  After the grading was completed, instead of re-seeding with grass we decided to mulch it...

And here is what it looks like now.  I think this is my favorite part of the yard...

On the other side of the house (the south side), there were two large juniper bushes that we removed.  It was the perfect spot to put a garden, I decided.  So, Max built me my own fenced in garden area...

It looks quite different now as everything is much larger (and producing food) but you get the idea.  I'm already scouting out places for the garden to go at the new house...  :)

And this concludes the House Before and After series.  Thanks for coming along on this ride with me!  It was a lot of fun for me to go back down memory lane for a lot of this.  AND, it certainly helped guide me on taking pictures of the next house (in preparation for something similar).  I am excited to see what changes we can make at our next house.  And, I really truly hope that the next couple who live in our house love it as much as we did.  I'm sure they will.