Landscaping

 When Bryan and Mary bought their house 12 years ago the curb appeal was lacking. The lady who lived there was very old and her front flower bed (I’m being very generous calling it that) was just white rocks.

Drove me crazy, so Mike and I picked up the majority of the rocks and I shared some of my perennials with them.

It was time for some improvements. Mary and the boys were visiting St. Louis so Bryan and I took on the task of updating the front. Mary likes things simple and clean, so deciding what we were gonna do was easy. The hard part was getting it done.

We spent one whole day digging up the flowers.

The Before

Most of the flowers I brought back home with me. I always have room in my backyard. I did move some to the other side of the porch where the sun don’t shine and it was just dirt.

Bryan moved the top layer of border stones to the sidewalk and started power washing. 

The stones came out beautiful,  but at closer look the sidewalk was filthy. 

He dug up the bigger plants and I worked on the daffodil bulbs. I had a 5 gallon bucket FULL of bulbs. I’ll be planting them in my yard come fall. 

Power washing the first layer

I worked on the weeds and Bryan washed the layer of bricks that were buried in the ground. We noticed that the sidewalk and front porch could use a good washing too. I finished weeding while Bryan got to play with his power washer and cleaned the front of the house, the front porch and steps and all down the sidewalk. I think he was having fun.

A trip to the Home Depot and we had weed control landscape paper and 3 bushes to go with the 2 azaleas Mary’s mother had bought.

To be planted later

We decided to take a days rest and finish later.

I was not happy with the small plants available for the price in Chicago, so the next day I went to my HD in South Elgin and got bigger bushes. 1/2 price too.

Mike joined us for day 2 (thank the lord) so while Bryan and I went back to his HD and returned the tiny bushes, Mike raked and moved the left over rocks for a smooth, level flower bed.

Mike and Bryan planted the 5 bushes.

Right where I told them too

Time for the weed control. I acted like I’ve done this before, but I haven’t, I just watched a guy on YouTube. 

After some small disagreements between me and Bryan - he won one, and I won 1 - the weed control got cut, pinned down and border stones repositioned.

Bryan did trust me on the mulch and bought the 8 bags I wanted.

Just Enough

The front looked so good. It was great spending the time with Bryan doing something I just love to do. I was sore in every muscle in my body, but I’m so proud of what we did. He tells me Mary and her Mother both loved it. The boys thought it looked good too.