Outdoor living space updates

Mando's been putting in some major sweat equity this summer, putting in a brick patio in front of the house where there was some raised landscaping including huge boulders and succulents (which he divided and moved to the backyard). This patio is a mix of old/reclaimed/repurposed bricks and new bricks. It was tricky because the bricks were slightly different widths, but somehow he made it all work,  He just has to fit in a few more bricks here and there around the edges, but it's basically done.

This will be a nice seating area in cooler weather for parents of piano students.

Mando also added five new rose bushes to those that were already there, which will eventually create a little informal fence around the front of the patio for privacy.

The major backyard re-do continues.  Since we came back from LG, he's been adding more planting beds with drought-resistant perennials (curved to match the curves of the sidewalk).  In between these beds there will be a little footbridge leading to the area outlined to the left with pavers, which will be a seating area under the large persimmon tree.  Where there is dead grass in the picture (this is drought-stricken California) there will be mostly winding gravel paths, except that the vegetable garden will be expanded a little bit also into the yard.

Here's one of the beds.  The plants in the back row, second and third from the right, have really pretty red blooms (Mando just trimmed them the other day).  The hummingbirds can't get enough of them! We are seeing lots of bees and also monarch butterflies come through and alight on these plants.  

This end of the yard is starting to look much better.  This shows the great new iron dining set we bought (we've been using it a lot!) on the new patio area.  The table is bigger than it looks in the photo--seats six comfortably, and the other night we actually had eight people out there.  The patio is almost done, but not quite.  The furniture the kids are sitting on was bought last summer for the new gazebo. We realized that we might use it more out here, and put some other furniture in the gazebo.  We didn't plan for it all to match (black and steel grey) but it does!  

Slowly, but surely, we're getting there!  We're making sure to enjoy it all every step of the way.  

Here's how the side of the yard with the patio looked back in 2006.  Nice lawn, was great for when the the kids were little, but just not going to work anymore with our current drought situation.