Three Mango Seeds: RAISED FLOWER BEDS & LOTS OF YARD WORK

We've been doing some major yard work over the last month so I thought I'd share a little of what we've done.

Here's an older picture of our yard and what we began with.

The monkey grass in the front bed has completely taken over and is almost as tall as the lights. We need beds around the base of our trees. We want to plant a privacy screening around the back fence where the pool is and we still need to build a deck for the pool. We want to put in an outdoor fireplace and build a small shed. We're just a little over ambitious for one summer so I'm sure all of this will be completed over multiple summers.

A couple of summers back we added the large window screens to help keep our home cool from the hot Oklahoma west sun. You can read about those here.

Can you see the mound of dirt over by the cars? That is being brought around from the back where we are putting in a pool for the kids. Before long, that little pile turned into a mountain! LOL

Here's a few shots of the total destruction going on in the back yard.

Weeping Willows were torn out, lots of dirt removed to put the pool about 3 feet into the ground and a little yard leveling. I had to keep reminding myself that it always looks worse before it begins to look better.

Once all the demo was done we slowly started putting things back together. The pool was installed, you can read about that here and here.

We planted 18+ Photina's to help give the backyard privacy. We also added stepping stones to get around the pool and garden area. The deck will be added later this fall and hopefully the outdoor fireplace since our family loves to sit outside and play Farkle while we roast smores. However, I'm realizing that those last two rather large projects might get pushed off until next Spring. Since this will most likely be our forever home I guess we've got time.

We knew we wanted raised flower beds in the front yard so we made good use of all the dirt removed from the backyard that was dug out for the pool.

Next we had about 10 tons of large native rock delivered. Yes, it was a LOT of rock but we wound up using every last one!

Here it is after.

This next crape myrtle was my grandpa's. He had planted it in his yard nearly 20 years ago. When he passed away I dug it up and put it in our yard at our old house. Believe it or not when we sold our old house we dug it up again and moved it here once the foundation was laid. Every time I look at it it reminds me of my grandparents. I'm amazed at how well it has done with all the moves!

We still have a lot to do outside & inside to make this our forever home but we're up for the challenge. I'm finding that now we've decided to stay here that I'm starting to see lots of possibilities that I didn't see before. God is good.