Working on the Back Yard - Part 1 of X

Hey everybody!  So we've officially lived in the Long Beach house for almost 90 days now, and while the inside is all done (yes, I'll do a blog on that eventually, but that'll have to wait until I dust the place and clean all the dog slime off everything to take pictures), we're still hard at work on the outside.  You'll see that I've titled this blog post Part 1 of X, as I really have no idea how many of these we'll end up doing...

Anywhoo, the front yard is great - it was already designed when we moved in, and other than adding a few herbs (basil, rosemary, and cilantro) and pulling out a few plants that were overcrowded/dying, we haven't done much there.

Here's the official Zillow shot of the front.
Decomposed granite landscaping

with tall hedges and palo verde trees.

All low irrigation, which is awesome.

Some shots from the front steps:

Agave plants with lavender

Itty bitty basil in the front row with
more succulents and lavender

Cilantro!

The back yard was another story entirely.  Most of it was grass, which we'd rather not keep up with; it's a pain to mow, it costs a lot to water, and since we don't have human kids, we don't really need a soft play area.  In all of the moving madness, we seem to have neglected to take pictures of the entire back yard as it was, but you can see part of it here:

You're welcome.

As those who have visited us know, our lot backs up to Del Amo Blvd, which is a decently busy street.  When we moved in, we immediately noticed that it was pretty darn noisy back there (we actually noticed that before we bought the house, so it wasn't a surprise or anything).  While the fence kept some noise at bay, and the previous homeowners planted those sad little bushes you see in the photo above, they weren't doing very much to make it as quiet as we wanted.  We started saving up for an actual block wall and in the meantime, we started other work.

Our eventual plan is to have a large section of decomposed granite (DG, from this point on) in the back yard with space for a pizza oven/fire pit in one corner of the yard, and a short, slightly raised wooden deck off the back of the garage.  The first project was starting to remove the existing rock from around the established pepper tree and between the house and garage.  The pepper tree area will eventually be covered in DG, and we're thinking of pavers between the house and garage.  Either way, the rock needed to go.  Conveniently, the western side of the house had a long, narrow run of plain dirt, so the rock had an immediate home.

The tree area - 

all of that used to be rock.

We left some rock here until
we finish this project,
mainly to keep the dogs out of pure mud
when it rains.

Those concrete slabs will come out

when the pavers go in...

The western side of the house -

we now have a lovely homemade redwood gate

where the dinky white metal one is,
and this area of rock is filled in.

The rock project was primarily mine, while Chris took over the enviable task of renting a sod cutter and taking out most of the grass.

Moving everything down
to make removal easier.

With much of the sod removed,
it was irrigation time!

Thankfully, the irrigation system was already established in the yard, and it wasn't much work to dig it up and convert it from a sprinkler system to drip irrigation.  In the picture above, you can also see that we've removed the pathetic little bushes from the fence line.  In addition to being kinda dinky, they also weren't doing particularly well.  We found out why when Dad and Risa came over to help us do yard work over Labor Day, and we discovered that some previous owner planted palms and then never removed the root balls (essentially, they cut them off at ground level and left them there).  We ended up digging SEVEN of those f*ckers out of the ground with our trusty pick axe over the next few weeks; we ended up having to ask the wall guys (foreshadowing!) to haul a few of them away for us, as they were too heavy for the two of us to handle on our own.  You can kind of see the start of one of the holes in the picture below, up near the top left of the shot.  The root balls were probably 3-4 feet in diameter and the biggest ones weighed close to 150 pounds; they were substantial.

The remaining grass along the back fence - 

and our biggest helper.

Remaining grass along the rest of the fence.

During this time, we also put together a garden box; since we moved into the Casa Grande house all those years ago, I've loved growing my own herbs and veggies and although the actual results are sometimes mixed, it makes me happy.  Given the generally superb weather out here, we figured it was time to get our garden growing!  Since we may end up playing with the location on this one (particularly once we get our other ideas underway), we didn't go with pavers for this garden; instead, we selected redwood planks, as they are naturally resistant to different things (nope, can't remember what specifically, so...things...) and they look pretty.  Since the garden isn't anchored to the ground, we can pick it up and move it relatively easy, should the need arise.

Master builder at work!

We started the garden out near the western fence line, so it would get morning sun and afternoon shade.  It's also under the overhang of the pepper tree, which loves to dump crap into it, so we'll see if that poses a problem long-term.

We've used this brand of soil -

Kellogg - in other gardens before,
and it's good stuff and not too expensive.

The garden comes together!

That's weed paper on the ground around it.

The finishing touches - 

irrigation (rather necessary)

and the anti-dog fencing.

Also, I guess technically these pictures

are not in true chronological order,
as you can see the wispy little trees still in the back.

Eh, whatever.

Alrighty, we have a few more projects that have been happening, but this post seems long enough for now.  Stay tuned for future updates!

Later!

Amy