Attacking the Front Yard

Boy, did we ever need a full 3-day weekend to get done what we had planned! Our biggest task was to clean up the front yard. After having a 2-year tenant that could care less about yard upkeep, we moved into the townhouse with it looking like this:

The landlord, when she lived there, must have planted some ivy for ground cover, which would have been all well and good, had it not turned into this:

Completely overgrown! To make matters worse, every time I walked up the front steps to the door I would get whacked in the face with a cobweb from the over grown bushes. Not to mention the little bugs that would nip at my arms and legs as I fumbled to get in the house! Needless to say, after a couple weeks, I was sick of being bitten and entering the house with a mouth-full of spider-web!

So Friday night, the boyfriend and I hustled over to Lowe’s to stock up on things we’d need to get the job done! I actually got out of work a couple hours early that day and made one of my tasks to trim the hedges before we got started with the rest of the work Saturday morning. Once stocked up at Lowe’s, we came home and got to bed to get an early start! Little did I know that the boyfriend’s definition of early start was to get out there at 7am, demolishing the overgrown ivy and various ground cover.

After a cup of coffee to wake me up, I suited up in long-sleeves and pants (don’t want all those misplaced bugs coming after our sweet skin!) to help tackle the task of taking the front yard back from all the buggies! A few hours later we were looking much better! (Well, the yard was at any rate, we definitely weren’t going to win any beauty pageants after all that labor!)

Want to see what we ended up with? Well, here you go!

Look, Ma! No weeds! Boy, does that ivy root itself in there! I’m sure we’ll be picking it out weekly for a while, the only way we would’ve gotten all the weeds out would have been to till the yard, and well, I don’t want to buy a till!

We bought a new hose, since the old one burst apart when I turned it on (which equals me, soaked, ugh), laid some pavers down to prevent the drip-off from creating a muddy pit, and purchased four bags of black mulch to really finish it off! Sadly, those hideous scalloped edgers were already in place, and since it’s just a rental, I’m not going out of my way to purchase new ones!

We may end up planting some flowers, but for now, it’s a low maintenance solution to our front yard. 5 hours of work, 4 bags of yard-waste, and less than $75 later, we have a happy yard!