Welcome to our big project inside of an even bigger project here
at our Milkbarn
(I should really get a good camera)
Here is a low quality photo of the end product
Now let me tell you how this all came about...
wait! a better photo!
It's all about crouching down
before weeding
now, weeded and ready
as I started this project it was part dread part anxiety riddled.
My sister Marcie helped me with my anxiety with great advice and the dread was replaced with sweat and a 48 hour workout :)
the skinny elm tree that met its fate when I found out they are very bad to have right next to a house. apparently the roots like to make trouble with foundations. And this house has seen enough trouble as it is!
So long Elm
I went out to a couple of landscaping places, I had some ideas but the main one was to buy plants and shrubs that are low maintenance and grow all over Colorado because to be honest I can't deal with anything else right now and I might be a lazy gardener
the first lot that came home with me
We picked up dirt/compost mix with some mulch down the road
the soil in Boulder is really hard and full of clay so it's a challenge to get much to grow....this is what the landscapers told me and I believed them emphatically!
When I posted this on my instagram, my sister stated most people use shovels to do this kind of work but when you have access to an excavator? It gets a lot easier to til the earth
haha!
down with the elm
plotting out the plants
weed barrier down
finished product
As Clay excavated the other side of the front yard he dug out some nice boulders we used for accent finishes
cheyenne spirit echinacea
crimson pygmy barberry
love these grasses
these are everywhere in Boulder. they grow fast, attract bees and add some color
dwarf butterfly bush
white pontentilla
mexican heather
coronado hyssop perennial
ninebark
Around the corner from our fresh landscaping is the
unfinished and un-fresh front porch.
I can't wait to clean this up and get our new door on.
Another area that was torn up was the southeast side of the front door and landscaping
We tore the well house down, old post fencing,
the wild roses(sniff, I liked those :( ) and that big cement thing is the well...later in the day a bunch of wood and stuff fell in it when Clay hoisted the cap off, so we had to shock the well which is pouring clorox into it to kill everything.
We all smell like we have been swimming at our local pool now,
ha ha!
with all the natural disasters surrounding those in and out of our country my heart swells up with wanting to do something...
and then I look at this photo and jokingly say to my self...hurricane Clay seems like a category 3, doable messes
lining the kids out for work just like he does at work
after we moved all the dirt out from around the well, we put it out back where we plan on having a patio and we needed the fill for it.
Yay! We found a place for it!
cleared out
the blue minion type thing is the well pump
super classy
it will get hooked up on the inside of our house soon
my neighbors down the road have a 100 goats
eating down their landscape. they really eat everything.
our back yard will remain wild though
a view at sunset of our valley
and looking towards the flatirons
Also, before we tore everything up the kids started school!
(summer went by way too fast)
middle school
high school
elementary school
entertaining school
I watched the eclipse with the 3rd graders
Boulder got 94% coverage
Clay was in Charlotte and watched totality!
I'm almost positive getting tickets to a Broncos game for him was better than the eclipse though :)
And when he is not traveling for work or tearing things down...Clay likes to cook. We bought a pasta maker and I'm in heaven because after 16 years, I think he's given up on me making potatoes and has gone to the dark side, moo ooh ah ah ah
As I landscaped I went through a series of thoughts in which I cannot fully articulate but it kind of went along the lines of...
You can change the landscape of your life if you are willing to pull out the stuff you don't want.
I have personal weeds that crop up, we all do.
So when I took this photo I captioned it
"you can always find something good in the weeds"
I'm sure it's all part of the plan, that sunflower in a bed of weeds...we all need a little opposition to grow :)
we (meaning Clay and sometimes me)
are finishing up the roof for now.
also
13 more days until autumn!!!
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