Newspaper + Nephew = New Landscaping

Almost a month ago I started sprucing up my small outdoor space. Well, it's been a slow process between the rain, my work schedule and, honestly, my laziness!

Recently, I recruited some slave labor help from my eldest nephew (see him enjoying the Dumbo ride during our recent trip to Disney World) to finish up the project.

 

First we tackled the two large pots flanking my front door. Above is my first attempt at filling them - I'm usually very afraid of mixing colors. As you can see I stuck with white and purple at the beginning. 

After seeing the riot of color in other people's landscaping, I decided to be bold and add some other colors. I gave the nephew the spade and told him to dig me some holes and the dirt flew! (I didn't have the camera with me at the time so I have no visual documentation.)

He informed me that he can dig some great holes because of all of his time in the sandbox! I agreed and grabbed a broom.

Here's the final product.

 

We also had to tackle spreading some mulch. It was getting hot so we did one side of the patio that morning and I finished up the other side a few days later.

One trick that my mom taught me is a clever way to control weeds using newspaper! It's such great advice that I recently saw an article in the Indianapolis Star telling folks about it.

If you have large sections of your landscaping that you don't plan on planting and you want to keep the weeds away, layer newspaper on the bare ground, wet them down and then place your mulch on top!

 

I know it's nothing like the landscaping at the folks' farm that I featured at the start of this project, but I'm proud of it and hopefully I can add to it over time.