Backyard... it's come a LONG way

When we moved into this house we knew the backyard was going to be a big undertaking. I can't imagine having more land! It has taken us a year to get to where we are with it and it's still not completely done and won't be for a while. But we've made good progress.

Here are the "before" pictures. They aren't true before pictures because Greg had already done a lot of manual labor at this point. It was pretty bad.





Greg had to tear down a couple of cement "walls". I think the previous owners were trying to a water feature or something but never came close to finishing it. They also had a bunch of sand in the middle of the yard where they had had pavers for a patio and so kindly took them with them when they moved. I think another area was supposed to be a "river" through the yard but it too was incomplete and scary looking. We also found out that one of our other neighbors had put in a pool and the previous owners had let them dump all of their dirt into our backyard. I'm glad that I have a husband who likes to work with his hands and isn't afraid to do a little hard manual labor. Despite his willingness though, we ended up hiring a guy after about 3 months, to finish removing the debris and grading the backyard for us. He charged us less to do everything than it would have cost us just for Greg to take all the cement, rocks, and extra dirt to the dump.

Axton loves working beside Greg though. Too bad he wasn't older. It would have been a great chance to teach the boy how to work hard. Guess we'll have to find other ways!




The "finished" product. We have put in 4 citrus trees (pomegranate, lemon, orange, and grapefruit). We put up vines all along the back wall. We put in grass and a garden that is fenced off. We have bought patio furniture and put in a built-in bbq. We've put in speakers and fans.







We still would like to put in some more filler rocks, a firepit, pavers on our patio, a club house for the kiddos, maybe a sandbox somewhere. We still have a ways to go but at least it's nothing like what we bought. I love that Axton can go out and play anytime to his hearts content and I don't have to worry about him.