A Dirty Little Secret

I didn’t want to tell you, buuuuut, alas, this little project left me no choice.  We have a dirty little (or perhaps medium sized) secret.  It’s true.  I showed you our concrete oasis back yard. Do you remember that?  Well, the concrete oasis’ ugly sister is hiding just around the corner.  Right here:

You can tell easily why we hate this little spot.  Just look at those weeds…uugh!  And the mud—don’t even get me started.

From the pictures, it’s probably hard for you to tell why we love this spot.  It’s kind of like that green chair that I told you about.  The green chair that I hate to love?  This area is the same way.  I hate that I love it—because that means that I can’t get rid of it.  And why do I love it?  Because these two citrus trees have the most amazing scent you’ll ever smell.  Because the flowers are beautiful. Because hummingbirds flit and fly through these trees every single day, sipping the sweet nectar from the flowers. Oh, yes—and because we live in Orange County, so it is so perfect to have an orange tree.  We love eating the fruit that was grown in our very own yard.

So, back to the mud.  Our dear pup, Tommy, has befriended the neighbor’s dog on the other side of the white fence.  So Tommy loves to spend hour upon hour outside running through afore mentioned mud, and barking at afore mentioned dog (and sometimes whining—because he wants to play…seriously?).  So, if you look very closely at that first picture, you can see that there is a green fence that we set up…which Tommy has figured out how to crawl through.  After about two days of that, we decided it was time for a new fence—and invested in this beauty:

And so far so good.  Less barking + less muddy paws = Happy Mommy & Daddy Pond.

We have some other projects to tackle in the side yard, and we’d love your input—so here are the details:

1) We’re going to pull the weeds, so pretend they aren’t there.

2) We want something to cover this muddy area.  The grass that is here is “volunteer” grass.

• We had originally thought about planting moss (it takes light foot traffic, which is good for fruit picking), but are a little concerned that it might take too long to grow in, and wind up being costly to get it all covered.
• Alternatively, we are considering grass, which we think will be less expensive, but are concerned that it won’t grow in well around the base of the trees—which will leave us with a “patchy” look.  We’d love to get your thoughts and ideas.

And, check back later this week–based on your advice, we’ve made a decision about what we are going to do with the sliding glass door in the dining room—and we’ll fill you in later this week.

Until then, let us know what you think about our side yard project!