first mow!

20 days after seeding, this is how long our grass has grown...so long that it was ready for its first mow!  :)

putting it all together

putting together the pieces of the puzzle....just this little bit took dan and our nephew an entire day yesterday...noone said gettin' to pretty was gonna be an easy venture! 



The Stone

Dan had to make two runs to the quarry today to get all the stone needed (over 2 tons) for the front yard. 

Then he had to unload ALL of that stone.  I love my hubby!  He's such a dedicated, hard worker.   :)  Below is a photo of only half of the stone. 

Compacting Crushed Granite

Before we can lay down our flagstone, Dan has to compact the decomposed crushed granite with a hand tamper.  We will get there, slowly.....but surely!

Poor Dan hard at work.  :)

day 7 after seed planted

Here's some images of our backyard on the 7th day after we planted our seed.  The middle section, next to the tree doesn't seem to be sprouting too many sprigs yet.  We're thinking that when it rained the day after Dan laid down the seed, the seeds in that particular spot might have got swept to other sections of the yard.  We'll just have to throw down some more seed...no biggie!  Movin' right along!  :)

laying down the crushed granite

dan and our nephew justin have been hauling decomposed granite from the stone yard this afternoon.  first load has been dropped off....it's looking prettier already.  and, we haven't even laid down our stone yet.  :)

sign of life

the first signs of life...so exciting!  :)

rain...just when ya don't need it!

dan laid the seed down in the backyard yesterday.  and, then it poured rain all last night, sweeping all of our seeds all over the yard - in various places.  now, poor dan has to go back and prolly re-seed.  otherwise, we'll probably have patches of grass in certain places in the yard and none in others.  oh well.  the best laid plans....

flattened

dan took almost an entire day removing rocks and other debris from the soil in the backyard and then leveling it out with a roller.  we're just about ready to seed, once the soil is watered a little bit!

dirt removal and lawn edging

dan spent a good several hours shoveling the dirt out of the front yard and wheelbarrowing it to other sections of the outside of our house.  it was a back-breaking job.  but, somebody in our household had to do it.  and, it wasn't gonna be me!  :) 

yesterday, he started the edging around the perimeter of where we are planning to lay the flagstone.  hopefully, by the end of today, we'll have it all in place and ready to have the crushed granite to be dumped in!  *excitement!*  below is a photo of trey inspecting daddy's work so far.  :)

Some of you may have noticed that I changed the name of this blog.  I realized that the old name didn't encompass everything that we are doing.  The new name appears to be more fitting of the overall scope of our project!  :)