Our Outdoor Spaces

I’ll be the first to admit that our outdoor spaces are pretty dismal. Our front yard landscaping is minimal. It’s just rocks with a palm tree and a bougainvillea. We live in a neighborhood with an HOA, so I figure if we don’t have much to maintain, there’s not much they can send me notices about.  

My bougainvillea is growing out of control, but I’m not ready to trim it yet. It’s flowering like crazy and it looks so healthy that I don’t want to mess with it. Plus it’s the only plant in our front yard, so it might as well make a statement! 

Oh, I forgot to mention that we have a cactus in our front yard too! This little guy just started randomly growing a few months ago and I don’t have the heart to kill it. I’m guessing that our neighbors have a cactus on the other side of the wall and it’s just growing into our yard now. 

The backyard is even worse…I’m not even going to show you the whole thing because the amount of weeds in the yard is embarrassing! Let’s just stick to my pretty hanging flowers!  

I bought them at Home Depot during Memorial Weekend and I’m kind of surprised they are still alive (there's another one that's not pictured). It’s been well over 100 degrees every day since then and I wasn’t sure if they’d survive the heat. I have to water them at least every other day, but it’s worth it to finally have something pretty growing back here. Plus Ringo thinks the watering can is the coolest thing ever and tries to drink the water as I pour. He’s a weird dog.  

Of course, if we are going to talk about the backyard, I have to mention the swimming pool. My boyfriend and his brother replaced the sand in our filter a couple weeks ago and the pool has been sparkling ever since. Owning a pool is expensive and a lot of work, but they are so much fun during the summer. Plus Ringo loves swimming and it’s great way to burn some of his energy.  

We still have a lot of cleanup and projects left to-do in the backyard, but it’s coming around slowly. I’d really like to get it “presentable” this year, so you’ll probably be seeing more outdoor projects on the blog. Although I don’t know why I always wait until it’s 100+ degrees to start my outdoor projects…

Patio Furniture

The backyard chronicles continue -

We last left off in late June; we’d just had a new concrete patio poured. With the additional space, we finally had room for an outdoor dining set. And so the hunt for patio furniture began…

After comparing sets and measuring our space, I decided I wanted a rectangular dining table with room for 6 chairs. And after an incident with Ringo and our current bistro set, it would have to be mostly metal. I also wanted the option to add an umbrella since the table wouldn’t be under the patio cover.

I quickly realized that patio furniture is really expensive, even a cheap Wal-Mart set was going to be at least $400. Obviously I wasn’t going to pay that, so I started searching Craigslist multiple times a day. Stores also started putting their patio furniture on clearance, so I searched online and in-store too.

2 months later – I saw this picture on Craigslist:

Obviously that set is nothing like what I was looking for, but they lived close by and only wanted $80, so I clicked on the listing…

And there it was - the second picture in the listing:

$80 for the first set, $100 for the dining set, or $150 for both sets…

I bought both sets =)

Here’s my new outdoor dining set (cushions trashed and freshly hosed off):

(umbrella not pictured)

And here’s my new conversation set:

It’s pictured on the patio, but I think it’ll end up in the pool area. We could use more seating in there.

Oh, and ignore all of the weeds in the pictures – we’ve gotten a lot of rain the past few weeks and they are running rampant throughout the yard. This Friday is going to be yard work day, so most of that should be cleaned up.

I’m so happy to finally have some patio furniture…and just in time for the holiday weekend (not that we have anything planned). I still need to replace the cushions, but at least it’s a start. We still have TONS of work to do in the backyard, but it’s coming around slowly. You’ll probably see more backyard projects once the weather starts cooling down in a couple months. I can’t wait!

And if you are wondering what the Ringo incident was– here’s a picture of my bistro-set chairs:

Sigh…

Above My Skill Level

When I bought my house I knew the RV gate would need to be replaced soon. No sugar coatin’ – the thing was a piece of crap. I’d been planning to replace it for the last few months, but never got around to calling someone for an estimate. Then we got Ringo. And we knew that broken down fence wouldn’t keep our wild animal in.

I forgot to take a proper before picture, but these should give y’all an idea.

One night I’m looking at pictures of new RV gates,

My boyfriend:  “My dad can probably build that. I’ll call him tomorrow and ask.”

Me:  “Say whaaaa?! Just like this? The iron and wood and everything?”

BF: “Yeah, he has a welder.”

And that was that.

On Saturday the boys (my boyfriend, his dad, and his brothers) worked their buns off tearing down the old gate and hanging the new one. And on Sunday my boyfriend and I painted the gate and added the wood slats. Yep, I can only take credit for being an extra pair of hands and helping spray paint the gate and posts. Welding is not one of my skills.

Ready for amazingness?

The Front (and a peeking puppy)

The Back

Who knew you could fall in love with a gate?!

Cost

Material – around $300

(My boyfriend doesn’t track what every little thing costs like I do)

And I definitely owe my boyfriend’s dad dinner!

I can’t forget the most important thing: It keeps my little bear safely in the yard!