The Yard That Ate My Life

I bought a little tree ~ a beautiful, delicate looking, Green Laceleaf Japanese Maple. It was an impulse buy. My thought, when I saw it was that it would be fabulous on my deck. I don't have a deck. Yet. We're working on getting one built this summer (that's another post altogether!). After I got it home I apparently blacked out, drove to Lowe's and purchased 8 tons of dirt, mulch and plants thinking that I needed to "spruce up" the front yard. Then I thought that I might put the beautiful little tree in the front yard where it could be admired by all.

And so began the project that became enormous!

I looked through ideas on Pinterest, which, I have decided is a huge black hole of time wasting enormity, but I found a post that said something like, 30 easy ways to beautify your yard or somesuch nonsense - hmmm, I like the sound of "easy" and I do want a beautiful yard.

So, after looking through the choices I picked this edging that showed a man simply plopping stones down with his little trowel. I loved the look of it and it was practical because you could mow without having to do any edging! (I have a serious hate of edging) - and the best news, Lowe's carried the exact pavers!

O.k, so after doing some sketchy math, I head back to Lowe's where I purchase 140 of these pavers and various other yard type tools and one really bad ass pick axe that my husband talked me into because we live on a shale bed and can't afford to purchase our own backhoe.

By the time I finished getting supplies it looked something like this:

I was seriously beginning to question my sanity! I'm old! I just had full hip replacement surgery! What was I thinking? Too late to go back... so off I went with my shiny (very heavy!) new pick axe and shovel. The first 3 feet took me forever, apparently there's a learning curve to using a pick axe. But I doggedly persevered and after only (ha!) four hours my yard looks like this:

In my head, I was going to have the pavers down and all the sod out and the beds ready to plant by the end of the first day. I would then happily plant the flowers etc... and my yard would be the envy of the neighbors. Instead it looks like someone detonated a small explosive and ran away laughing. I might have passed out on the front steps.

I get up the morning of the second day - of course its raining. I wait and putter around the house, keep checking the window, finally around 11:00 am the rain stops. I'm out there in a flash with my bad ass pick axe slogging around in the mud. I promise myself I'm not going in until the sod is all up and the pavers are all in place. The mailman comes by and says, "isn't that exactly where you were yesterday?" I told her I was stuck in the mud.

Seven hours later I look up and it looks like this:

What?! Hey, not bad!! I had to stop because I ran out of plants and mulch. I also changed my mind about putting the Japanese Maple in the front garden, I really wanted him for the deck so for now, he's gonna chill on the front porch and when the deck gets finished, he can move to his final home.

Once I finish the plants and clean up the mud I'll post some more pictures.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with the results - not bad for an old lady!