We went into summer with the intent of doing a little bit of landscaping. That little bit turned into a lot! Our initial plans were to put down some edging, some stone and some outdoor lighting along the walk that goes through our yard. After getting the ground ready and starting the edging, we decided to get an above ground pool installed. Probably would have been much easier if we had decided on the pool first. But, life isn’t easy. After the pool was finally installed, we continued with our plan for lining the outside of the walk with stone and lights and expanded on it to include 4 - 2 foot square stones to go under the ladder for our new pool and surrounding the pool with stone as well. We ended up with 4 - 80 pound 2×2 foot stone blocks and around 8000 pounds of river rock. We still have around 1200 pounds left in the driveway with additional plans that we put off until fall.

Who would have figured how much work that would entail. It turned out to be some great exercise and ended up happening on some of the hottest days of the year, which made having a pool even better. When you start on a project like that for the first time you have no idea of how much work it is going to take. But, after spending countless hours grading the land, laying down landscaping fabric and carting thousands of pounds of river rock around, I now know what goes into a great looking yard and have a new found respect for the people who do that kind of work on a regular basis.

Our yard still has a long way to go and we have many other plans for it as well that include a retaining wall at about the halfway point in the yard, some stone benches, a deck to go with our new pool and some much needed drainage. What started out as a small summer project has quickly turned into something that is going to take us several years to complete and would probably be considered as a major renovation. A year ago I couldn’t have even dreamed of doing half of the work I have already done to this point, and now I am looking forward tot he work that still needs to be done. It is good exercise and a great way of spending quality time with the family. What more could you ask for? Here are a few pics we have taken.

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