DIY: Outdoor Edition

This weekend we upgraded our landscaping.  It had been several years since we did anything major on the outside of the house and it needed some work.

The driving factor behind this was we had several bushes that looked ratty and/or dead for most of the year.  So with no small amount of effort on Jerry's part-we pulled them out.  This left dirt and holes behind, plus some of our landscaping rock has sunk in or washed away.  So we also needed to replace some of that.

We decided not to go the bush route again and instead bought several large pots to place where the bushes used to be and then filled them with various assortments of flowers.  I like that it added color to the house and looks "neater" than the scraggly bushes but don't like that they will require extra care on my part-hopefully I can keep them alive and pretty!

Here are all the pots...

 And here is how the garage side of the house now looks with its new rocks and new pots!

At the end of winter my phlox were looking really terrible.  Like, I thought they were all dead and I was so sad because I have been waiting so many years for them to really spread out.  But, they are ok and look great.  But for some reason only the purple thrived.  There is just one lonely little pink one in the middle.

 Here is what the front of the house now looks like!

On the back side of the house we had some bushes as well-different kinds.  They didn't do very will this winter and had a lot of dead branches and leaves.  So we cut them back to the ground and will let them regrow.  But in the meantime that side looked pretty bare.  I just loved these pre-made pots at Lowe's so we set a few of those out there to liven it up.  We are actually going to go back and get one more but you get the idea.

 I don't know what these are but I just loved the color combo!

 So pretty!

The rest of these are just some of my various flowers.  Some new, some old, but all pretty!

After we got everything we done we mowed the yard (which is way faster now with the new tractor).  Then it rained and we took a nap.  Did I mention this project involved moving more than 2500 lbs of rock, dirt, and mulch?  Everything hurts.