Fresh Landscape

When we moved into our house about five years ago, we knew it would make the perfect starter home. It was a foreclosure, and sat for quite some time, so we knew we had a lot in store for us in order to get it into good shape (the bones were good, just needed a lot of cleanup and updating). We quickly tackled the interior, but the front (and back) yard were put on hold. Just a note, the HOA are not fans of dead grass in the front yard. ;)

We worked on the front yard here and there, by giving the grass some much needed TLC, trimming up the shrubbery, adding fresh mulch and removing the dead tree by the front window. At this point, the front yard was considered good enough for the time being.

A few posts back I talked about my new hobby, gardening. So, a couple months ago we had two large inner shrubs removed from our front landscape to make room for some new (prettier) landscape. We also had the two large outer shrubs trimmed down - they were way overgrown, even worse than in the above picture, and such an eyesore.

I've been dreaming of doing this since the day we moved into our cute little house!!

Once the shrubs were removed, we added a fresh, much needed coat of paint to the shutters on the front of the house, which really helped brighten them up... considering they were looking very worn, dull and dirty, and have probably never been touched up like, ever.

I did the best research I could on plants to survive in a front yard that receives either a lot of shade or a lot of sun, depending on the type of weather given on that particular day, and lots of good ol' Texas heat. The best I could come up with were Hostas, Azaleas, and Liriope, which are a bit plain, but I liked the look of them together. So, we took a trip to Lowes and we ended up coming home with Liriope (on major sale), Hostas, two other plants that I can't even remember what they're called but they caught my eye and could survive in my yard (score!), and lots of beautiful dark mulch.



Paint color on shutters is Divine White by Sherwin Williams

This picture was taken after we planted everything a couple months ago; since then, we've lost two Hostas - couldn't stand the heat - and the other plants have grown a lot, as well as the outer shrubs have filled out since we trimmed them back.

That yard flag is looking a bit pathetic... (confession: it looks even worse now than it does in the picture) so I'm thinking of ordering this one.

Now I have a couple empty pots to fill with pretty plants and flowers to put in my backyard! Something about greenery that just makes me smile.

Until next time...