My back yard contains an excavator

Me right now

And lacks a lot of other things. Such as:

  • A crappy 30+ year old chain link fence.
  • A giant overgrown pine tree.
  • A second tree that was growing through the fence.
  • Three really awful wooden planting boxes.
  • The Rose of Sharon (hibiscus) tree – I have a slight sad about this, but she couldn’t really be saved.
  • The full berry patch – which, as it turns out, contained a LOT of poison oak and poison ivy ๐Ÿ˜ฌ๐Ÿ˜ฌ๐Ÿ˜ฌ.
  • The goddamn monkey fudging grape vines ๐ŸŽŠ๐ŸŽ‰๐ŸŽŠ๐ŸŽ‰.
  • The pool deck – which, as it turns out was not based on anything. There was no structure, support or concrete underneath it at all.
  • No more hog weed or haunted bamboo!
  • The chipmunks and *skunks are almost certainly fully evicted as they were living in the pine tree and berry patch respectively.
  • The hideous side of the house which was, quite frankly, dangerous has now been ripped out. They did discover an awful retaining wall that has just been made of poured concrete and shale stucco**. That’s going to add another $3000+ to the bill, as it needs to be dealt with else all our new work could be destroyed. Repair work will buy us 3-5 years before it needs to be replaced so ๐Ÿคท๐Ÿปโ€โ™€๏ธ.

*Yes. Skunks. I have seen them wombling through a few times, and a week or so ago I spotted two Cavorting in the neighbours garden.

Are they fighting? Who knows?
Yes it’s hard to see them – it’s dark!

**It’s cracked to pieces, full of holes and has a bloody triffid living in it.


The front is a separate part of the same main job. They have:

  • Ripped out all the bushes.
  • Grass all dug out – will be installing new sod*

They will be:

  • Installing a new kerb.
  • **Installing an underground drain.

*The back yard is simply going to be grass seeded rather than sod, in order to save some $$$$


**Both of these projects will, in theory, deal with the major flooding issues in our basement – or at any rate a decent part of them. We will still look to install a sump pump. Hopefully next year.


There’s other things happening too. It does turn out that the neighbour’s grandkids had occasionally developed signs of poison ivy/oak and they hadn’t been able to work out from where as there’s none in their yard. I apologised of course, but as I’ve witnessed said (teenage) grandchildren crashing over our fence into the berry patch with very little regard for my property? I don’t feel too guilty and their grandma said pretty much the same thing!


Obviously if it had been the little ones I would be far more concerned! I’m not a monster!


So yes, this year’s major house project is the backyard.

We are attempting to budget one project per year. Last year we had to get the chimney done. Then the A/C happened. Then the plumbing disaster. So this is the first time we’ve been in a position to choose what we do.

House ownership of something that is 120+ years old is… Fun ๐Ÿ˜ฌ๐Ÿ˜ฌ๐Ÿ˜ฌ

Author: Fliss

Wife, mum (of two), yarn-obsessed cat-slave

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