An update from my first post
How to easily get rid of your lawn and add whatever you'd like to put in it's place; easy low maintenance plants, landscape rock, vegetable garden, rose garden, the choice is yours only limited by your imagination!
I had wanted to get rid of it for so long. Let's face it, lawn takes a lot of maintenance and water. This was in 2008, we hadn't met our rainfall for the last few years, the very early beginning of our now severe drought. My neighbors thought I was crazy at the time!
I covered the existing lawn with a thick layer of newspaper. On top of the newspaper added a thick layer of compost. The newspaper kills the lawn and turns into compost too. I consider it the lazy woman's way to garden. I really don't consider myself lazy, but I don't go looking for extra work if I can get away with an easier method =) Neighbors didn't understand why I didn't dig up the lawn, remove a layer of soil and replace it with "good" soil.
Recycled brick edging from the farm along the sidewalk to coordinate with rest of front garden area. Salvaged rock, from farm neighbor, made property line border. Keep that lawn over there!
I found this beautiful red slate at the quarry. I made paths from the sidewalk and driveway to the main sidewalk. Added some spring bulbs and a few Iris.
One year old
More plants were added - the garden was in a state of evolution. White and purple Violets, Foam Flower then Lily of the Valley and other perennials
Two years old
more planting of perennials and a Pomegranate,
previous years plants are bigger
Three years old
Still filling in nicely and evolving. Cherry tree was added.
Most recent
Some plants have flourished, some didn't. Along the way my dream white bike was added with basket full of petunias, Mom's Dove was added to my birdbath, a garden bench is in there somewhere, a garden lamp was added, and tons of Pomegranates are produced each year. I love it. Does my home look like anyone else's? Nope. We were the only house without a porch - we moved in and put up the huge arbor (now covered with climbing Roses and Jasmine) and now have NO LAWN. Nope, we're not a cookie cutter house any more ;)
House Entry showing some propagated Red climbers from Mom's garden on the left and beautifully fragrant Jasmine on the right.
Other posts you may be interested in:
beautiful! I love that you used newspaper to cover the lawn. I will save some newspaper for when im ready to create my own garden
ReplyDeleteThank you! Yes, eco-friendly and much easier (no, not lazy ;) lol
DeleteIf I weren't 86 years old, I'd seriously consider doing this to my small yard. It's beautiful!
ReplyDeleteFabulous !
ReplyDeleteThank you so much!
DeleteI wanted to get rid of our relatively small front yard but my husband was shocked by the idea. I ended up leaving a small grass area.
ReplyDeleteMy question for you is, how do you keep weeds out, or keep it weeded?
I pull by hand as soon as I see them. If they are deep rooted (dandelions) I use a trowel to help get them out. But since the soil doesn't get walked on/not compacted/ they pull out fairly easy. The plants are full grown now and the whole area has been taken over by a hardy sedum (ground cover) which keeps the weeds at bay. My worst enemy is keeping the Hollyhock in check - it reseeds itself all over! LOL I use boiling water on weeds that show up in the cement sections of the driveway.
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