A Yard!!

We finally have a yard!!! Chad spent all week digging up the dirt, installing a sprinkler system, and laying sod. Then we spent the day putting in flower beds and planting a tree on Saturday. Chad did a great job and it looks fantastic!! We thought it would be fun to have before and after pictures, so here they are.

For those of you who had been to our house before you can remember what the yard looked like. I didn't get a picture of the front yard before, but this is the side yard. Imagine this, but everywhere (the trees, etc. are part of the neighbor's yard):

Chaddy and Rylee dreaming of a yard:

Chad worked so hard and leveled off the whole yard (front and back), then installed sprinklers, and put out compost so it would be ready for grass:

Then Chad spent a very long, very hot day laying the sod! We are so excited for a yard:

After the grass was all in, we spent Saturday putting in flower beds and plants. There is one bed on either side of the porch and another big one in the back:

Front right side flower bed:

Front left side flower bed:

This is the backyard. Nobody has really seen it because it has been solid mud since we moved in and there wasn't really a good way to get around the house to see it. Now that we have grass it will be a great place to hang out! Also, it opens up into a park (that hopefully will be landscaped soon) so it will be a fun spot for Rylee to play:

The yard is shaped kind of funny, though. This is the other half of the yard. (The above picture is behind the main house part, and this is the area behind the garage):

We put one long flower bed all along the back of the house:

And this is our very first ever tree - a pin oak! We are hoping it will get big enough to shade the main yard area once it grows some:

Rylee is so excited to have a yard to play in! She spent all weekend running around in the grass and watching us plant flowers:

We worked ourselves to death (mostly Chad and with a lot of help from my mom!) but we are very excited to finally be able to play outside! We rushed to get it all in so that we can have Rylee's birthday party outside next week. (She is 1 year old on Thursday, can you believe it?) Chad has been waiting for soooo long to have his own yard to work in. (I think the only reason he wanted to buy a house was so he could have a yard!) It feels great to have it all done, though. And we are pretty sure that our neighbors gave a big sigh of relief when they saw it. We are kind of on a hill so there yard sits below ours and every time it rained their yard got flooded with mud from ours. We did our best to help them fix it with left over sod, and they have been very nice and patient with us about it. We are officially settled in!!!