Jody and Julie, this is for you!

Julie, somehowI doubt you'll be more impressed by our yard after seeing this, but I thought I'd show you our re-do last June 1st.

And Jody, here's the back yard since you were last able to see it. Has it really been that long? Zoinks!

Here we are starting at the back left of the house. I tried to pan all the way across to give you an idea of what was cleared. We opened up (read: cleared out the greenbrier and other brushy stuff) the back yard and left a few trees so the kiddos would have a place to play in our yard, so we wouldn't have to travel 20+ miles to play at a park. I'm really thrilled with it and I look forward to adding a few plants here and there to throw in some color. Speaking of color, the red line indicates the old yard and the new. I'll let you decide which is which. :)

Sorry about the blankets on the line. Oh, and the satellite dish was left in our woods by a precious previous owner. Why take it to the dump or give it away when you can toss it into the woods with some empty pallets and other miscellaneous things (bottles, buckets, string/rope, metal bars)? Quite a joy to remove the broken glass and rotten pallets.

Satellite dish now exposed for the world to see. Thinking about throwing in some pampas or zebra grass to help camoflage. Then again, the grass would be really tall there, and folks would wonder why we don't mow there, and probably assume we have a septic leak or other lovely scenario.

A view of the wheelbarrow still collecting misc. yard stuff that has since been removed and cleaned up. A joyful-looking deer target for my husband's extra-curricular activites. Hey, it could be worse. The "barn" as it's referred to is also going to get a facelift with some planting this year. Hopefully.

See the white thingy in the background? That is actually a little marker I have in to show me where I planted a wineberry bush I dug up from the woods near a friend's house. I believe wineberries are related to raspberries, but prettier and not as seedy. They are SO plentiful in the early to mid summer and are divine (with a big D) in a cobbler with blackberries.

And here we have our firewood pile that hasn't been stacked yet. :)

Talk with you soon!

XOJ