An Update on the Five Ugliest Spots in Our Backyard

In the spring of 2012 I wrote a post about the five ugliest spots in our backyard. The pictures were sooooooooooo bad. They really show how the upkeep of our home went downhill the year that we had Cooper and bought The Fixer Upper. That was a crazy year, my friends, a crazy year.

 

Since Coops and I have been spending a lot of time out on our deck and in our backyard this summer, it's given me a chance to slowly work on some projects around the yard.

 

Even though these are pretty small before and afters I still feel like sharing them anyway. These days any progress at all is a huge accomplishment. :)

 

Spot #1: Along Our Neighbour's Fence

 

 

While this area has gotten a bit better this year, it's still pretty bad. Whenever our neighbour's dog is outside, Lexie runs up and down the fence like a CRAZY DOG. You know when puppies do those little, wild puppy runs? Well that's how Lexie behaves x100. No matter how many times I try to seed this area she ends up tearing up all of the new grass. So, it still needs work.

 

Spot #2: The Grassy Area in the Middle of Our Yard 

 

Before:

 

 

 After:

 

 

This is one of the areas in our backyard that is looking SO much better. It took a lot of work but with some TLC we were able to bring most of our grass back to life. I'm planning on sharing a post on how we did it very soon.

 

Spot #3: Along the Driveway Fence

 

 

This spot looks exactly the same (ugly as bleep) with the lovely addition of some neon toddler riding toys. Someday I would love to have a garden along this area but as of today it still needs some serious help.

 

Spot #4: Side Garden

 

Before:

 

 

After:

 

This little garden beside our lower deck still needs some tweaking but it's looking quite a bit better. I shared a little bit more about it here.

Spot #5: Under the Upper Deck

Before:

After:

I am absolutely over-the-moon happy with our new deck skirting on our upper deck. It has made the biggest impact to the overall look of our backyard. Neither Alex or I can take the credit for it though - my father in law has been working on it for the past few weeks. I'm so, so, so grateful! Because the yard slopes quite a bit we had to get a bit creative with the bottom. We decided to stagger the bottom boards in three sections to match the three sections of railing above. The pressure-treated wood is still pretty green but eventually the boards will turn grey just like the rest of the deck.

So, what's next you ask? I'm drawing up some plans for a privacy screen on our lower deck. If you take a look at the (old) picture below, you can see our lounge furniture on the bottom deck.

The screen will go behind the furniture to give our neighbours a little bit of privacy from us. You see, there are (unfortunately) many times when I have to go running after bad dogs #1 and #2 with pajamas, no makeup, and very, very, very bad bedhead.

:)