Before:  Front View

                                                                   Before:  Side View

                                                     After:  Work Still in Progress

Before and After

When I moved to Raymond, in 2007, Bill promised me that we would fix up the house. He had owned it for about 10 years, and was quite happy living in the dining room and kitchen. The rest of the rooms were mostly used for storage  In the past five years, we have managed to bring this old house back to life again and make her into a comfortable, old, southern farm house, and I just love it. 

One area that Bill was not even remotely interested in though, was the yard. He said he liked having the bushes grow up. It made his house more private. From the street, however, it looked like Sleeping Beauty’s slummer home. The briars had grown almost completely around the house, and one of the big oak’s branches was almost to the front door. The Azalea, by the back door, was intent on keeping the screen door closed, and you had to squeeze through to get into the house. One hundred year-old Azaleas are tough customers. I cut it down to the ground  two years ago, and now it’s challenging us for the back door once again.

So with shovels, rakes, saws, and clippers, I set out to tame the wilderness, and sent Sleeping Beauty packing. I’ve learned a lot about landscaping in the past few years – good ideas, and stupid ones as well.  But I am determined to be a good southern gardener, and maybe in a few more years, I’ll have it the way I think it should be. In the meantime, check out my progress. I even found the rest of the front walkway six months ago!