I haven’t posted in a while, but that doesn’t mean that nothing has been happening on the house. We have projects going on inside and outside. One of the most satisfying projects for me is our backyard transformation. Flowers, shrubs, and trees feed my soul.

It was hard to find anything beautiful about our yard. I love heritage gardens and hoped to bring back plants and flowers that had thrived here many years ago. But there wasn’t much worth saving, so we had to start from scratch.

We began this project in early spring with a plan. Susan Schlenger created a landscape design for the entire property. Unfortunately, we couldn’t begin right away because of all of the other projects we were working on. The front yard will need to wait until we complete the porch, but at the end of summer, we were ready to begin the backyard.

There were several steps involved to get to the final result:

Hardscaping

The backyard had concrete paths that were probably laid shortly after the house was built. Originally, there was a barn and driveway, but after the barn burned down (1912?), it was replaced with the cement block garage (pre-1930). We believe that the brick pathway to the sidewalk was added after the porch was torn down in the 1950s. Clearly, the paths needed to be replaced.

We didn’t do much of this landscaping ourselves, but Caylie took on dismantling the brick path. At least some of the bricks are still whole, so we have a few more of the original bricks for our front porch.

DM Landscaping did the remainder of the hardscaping from removal of the old concrete to setting the pavers and building the walls. We chose to stay with concrete paths with Bristol Stone by EP Henry. The added sitting wall was part of the new landscape plan. For this, we used a new EP Henry product–Cast Veneer Stone wall in Aspen. We love how it turned out!

Clean Up

The next step was to remove all of the overgrown shrubbery and weeds. While I had some thought of digging out some of the old plants, there was poison ivy throughout, so complete removal seemed like the best plan! Our lawn was mostly weeds so there wasn’t anything to keep there either. The only plants we kept in the backyard were three trees–the giant pin oak in the middle of the yard, a large maple and a scraggly-looking dogwood tree. (Once we cleaned up around it, that dogwood looked much better!)

New Plants

I was so thrilled when the new plants began to appear. These potted plants were a harbinger of things to come. I continually walked through them, touching the leaves and smelling the flowers as I waited for them to be planted.

Fence

There was an existing fence on the north side of the property. We wanted to completely enclose the backyard by adding a fence on the remaining sides. While our original intent was to repair the existing fence, we soon discovered that it was too rotten to keep. We kept the posts, but everything else needed to be replaced.

Garage

While all of this was happening, David repainted the garage. It’s amazing what a difference power washing and two coats of paint can make! We used the same green on the garage doors as we used on the shutters of the house. For the wall color, I chose Benjamin Moore Brick House Tan to match the house’s limestone accents. We added a little red around the windows and brown trim around the doors.

Flower Beds

We gave all of the new plants a great start with compost and mulch. It was so fun to see the landscape plan take shape.

Flood!

In the middle of this project, Cranbury had a downpour and our entire yard flooded! I watched as my precious new soil raced down the new paths. The good news is that the water went away from the house instead of into it!

Lawn

After the remaining plants and fence were in, it was time for a new, lush, green lawn. Did you see the swing? One of David’s requirements for a proper backyard is a tree swing which he added promptly after the landscaping was in.

Final Results

Here are a few more before and after photos. While many of our plants are losing their leaves and will be dormant this winter, we know that next spring, the backyard will be more beautiful than ever. I can’t wait to see the tulips rise out of the dirt, followed by a progression of blooming roses, hydrangeas, coneflowers and more!