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Sunday, June 23, 2019

The Front Yard Design

It's good to know when you're in over your head and you can find someone to help.

This happened with our neatly packaged little farmhouse with an acre of raw land.  The house was upgraded by someone we think of every day but never knew, who redesigned the rooms, finished the attic, ran new electrical and plumbing, upgraded the kitchen and baths and did an outstanding job. The only thing we had to do was move in.

That great experience somehow gave us (me) the idea the rest would be a piece of cake. We muddled around with a garden and informal drips, uncovered an iris garden in the back that we've kept alive and been charmed by the figs, pomegranates and olives, but we couldn't make headway on the yard.

My hummingbird/butterfly/bee pollinator garden idea didn't come with a plan, just lots of drought friendly yard tours and pics from the internet. No wonder trying to do it was  front was lost in translation and has since languished for the last several years. I swear to you each of those rocks has a big ugly toothy grin reminding me I'd bitten off more than I could chew. Don't I know it. There was 43,800+ feet of unlimited potential. We needed a plan.

Pretty much we weed our hearts out and mow it like crazy, try to keep it neat and focus on the gardens all the while wishing the outside could reflect our deep love of living here. We needed someone with know how.

Enter Kimberly and a couple of yard installer companies, and we're pretty jazzed with the result.

We also met a great local guy to do the hard prep work, haul off the rock, level and rototill the yards and even run irrigation on the other side of the drive. Looks like there may be a little old fashioned bartering along the way.

Tomorrow it starts.