When we moved in

All of these photos were acutally taken on the day we went looking at houses and we ended up closing on this house about 3-4 weeks later. First is the side yard where the road in front dead-ends and then we have a road that runs along the side of the house on the other side of that road is for lack of a better word, a small forest. The AC is definitely an eye sore and I am still trying to figure out what I want to do to hide it. I am also planning on planting some shrubs that will grow tall in between several of the trees along the road to provide a little more privacy. Our house does sit up a little compared to the rest of the lot which is good for drainage but does allow people to see in easier.

Second, is the view from the back of our property of the house, and there is Clay, not me in photo (our real estate agent). The pecans are quite lovely (didn't produce this year though). We have since added a vinyl privacy along the back of the house (must have fence and doggy door).

Below is the view from the front which is a small covered concrete patio. The downed light post has been removed. We have a lovely view, the front of the yard slopes up and past the line of trees it dips down about 3 ft to the road and ditch, make the front a little more private, would also like to fill in between some of these trees with some shrubs for color and privacy also. Past the road though is a huge fenced in field which has been so lovely lately dotted with bales of hay.

Below was the view from our not currently covered but wish was covered back concrete patio, the view is different now with the addition of the vinyl fence. Will post those photos later. Our back property line is at an angle kinda following the neighbors shrubs back there.

Taken from my craft room facing to back yard. The closest tree is included in the privacy fence now, I had not taken into account the slope of the land when we added the fence it is not very private in the back because there is probably about a 2-3 foot slope from the back patio to where the fence was placed and the back neighbors can see right over it. Luckily they are over an acre away. As part of the closing agreement we also had the seller place sod in the "to be fenced" backyard area which looks so nice and has kept our carpet from changing to red from the local clay. Not sure how well you can see but they have lots of heavy equipment at the back left of the photo, we eventually want to plant leyland cypress back there to block out that view, in that general vicinity is where we are planning to put Clay's bee hives also.

As you can see we had and have a lot of work to do but it has been lots of fun and dreaming up new ideas has been a blast, I have several books on landscaping that I have been keeping ideas in and little by little it is becoming exactly what we want.

The ever important first post

I am so very new to the gardening world. My grandfather had a nursery and I remember him taking clippings and starting little seeds in tiny pots and he would let me make the holes with my little kid fingers to place the seeds in. My aunt and uncle always had a very interesting garden, she is very artsy and they both have eclectic taste. I still love the old piece of metal fencing in their backyard with beautiful old cobalt blue bottles turned upside down atop each post, that is where the muscadine vine grows in summer. My mom always enjoyed having a garden and since I was about 9 we lived in a refurbished 1890s "gingerbread house". My favorite part was the walk up the front stairs flanked by gigantic hydrangeas.

All this is leading up to telling you that when I went off to college every attempt I had at trying to grow things (except my pups) turned out disastrous. Dead, dead, dead. I have since gotten married and we just bought a house. Our house is on acre of land which had mostly been cleared except for several pecan trees, and a hodge-podge mix of trees along the property line (we are on a corner, the road in front dead-ends and we have a road along the side of the house with a small forest on the other side perfect for kitty capers but we will talk about Mr Whiskers later). We bought the house in the end of June it took about a month before the overwhelming desire to cover the acre in plants took over. Then it was off to the nursery with my poor husband (who for the record hates doing yard-work). He was a good sport though and we came home with a truck full of plants spent the entire day planting and the next couple of weeks hoping that somehow I had developed a green thumb. It is now 3 months later NOTHING has died and I have planted much more since. Today for times sake I am just going to be posting pictures of what the house looked like when we moved in but later I will make posts of the plants that we have added. Thanks for stopping by, have a great day and I welcome any comments or tips (keep in mind I am very new at this).