Backyard Projects

Family was coming into town the beginning of June for Pierce's Blessing Day so a few weeks leading up to that, we got busy in the backyard: Cement. Shade. & Furniture. It's not complete but little by little it's coming together.

This beast of a truck kicked it in our driveway for a few hours that morning (May 26th)...

Here's what it replaced: those red and gray stones as well as the rock that reaches the wall. Here's the BEFORE:

Ahhhhh. A bit more room for the kids to ride around, somewhere to put our garbage cans, and simply a cleaner look. Here's the AFTER:

We had this great idea to put the kids hands in the cement to leave our permanent mark on this house but by the time the cement guy had us come do it, it was pretty much dry. I was kind of bummed. There's only so much pushing you can do on your child's hand before you start wondering if you're breaking some bones. They barely made a dent but we know they're there!


We also had a sidewalk put in that leads from our backyard to the driveway...no more dragging that heavy garbage can across the rocks!!!! (a total pain. more for Adam than for me)

We get a lot of sun on the back side of our house so Adam installed a roller shade to block out some sun. Here it is all rolled up:


And new backyard furniture. A big upgrade from the metal chairs that we've back there rusting away. I've looked and looked for the perfect backyard furniture but to be honest, it's not worth spending a lot of money on this stuff when you live in Arizona...the sun and heat just bake it. If I had an unlimited amount of money I'd for sure buy me some West Elm or CB2 furniture (their outdoor furniture is pretty sweet this year) but I don't so I finally settled on some wood furniture from TJ Maxx Homegoods. I went for wood over iron thinking I could just re-paint each year to give it a fresh look. I painted a round table and bench lime green, surprise surprise. It's pretty refreshing to walk outside and see this burst of color from the bench which pulls from the grass and palm trees. I love it!