First Day of Spring

After a stormy night last night, the first morning of spring started off a little gray and overcast but became a truly gorgeous day! What a wonderful excuse to just relax and enjoy the garden awakening from it's winter slumber. Who could stay indoors on a day like today?! 


Garden update:
Hubby and I worked on the backyard a little bit over the last few weeks: adding additional chipped limestone to the path, carting in a ton (literally) of planting soil to plant up the garden bed by the back fence and behind the clubhouse, adding additional garden bed space by the deck steps (why is he always surprised when I bring out the spade and start digging out lawn?), and of course, squeezing in a few extra perennials and annuals where I could. 

We also moved the firepit area from under the oak trees to the end of the gravel path. I like that there is a focal point for your eye now as you look down the path. And luckily for me, that's opened up a whole new garden area to plant up! My kiddo would like to plant it with heat tolerant, desert-looking plants so I will have him work on the design and help me choose the plants! 

At the end of February, we went to Pedernales Falls for a family camping trip. The wind really picked up and was gusting our little tent with 30-40mph blasts. We decided to cut the trip short and come home... 
only to find our fences on both sides of the yard had blown down.

The fence posts were pretty rotten and well overdue to being replaced. We had just discussed replacing the fence with one of our neighbors three days before it blew down. Timing is everything! 

You can see our gorgeous new fence in this picture:

Well, after the fences were replaced, it sure gave us the drive to clean up the back yard... hence all of the garden and gravel work! 


You can see the new garden bed by the back gate in this shot taken from the back deck:

Notice a few things in this over view shot: I had to reserve a doggie "pathway" through the garden bed so they could get to the back gate. They were used to plowing through that area to go bark at people walking on the greenbelt trail.  I had originally placed pavers down on the dirt, then watched as they ran any which way but ON the pavers. I quickly realized that if I edged with rocks it would guide them to run on the soft dirt...
and it works! Always plan your garden with your frisky doggies in mind!  

And speaking of that... notice how they don't want to use the gravel path I built specifically for them last year and would rather wear down their own path on the lawn? 
sheesh... never mind the plan, they'll do what they want to anyway! 

See that bright blue chair at the end of the path? I'm going to be sitting in that in about 5 minutes, enjoying a cold drink, the last bit of sunshine and the absolutely gorgeous weather of this first day of Spring - 2013 here in Austin, TX... hope y'all have a great evening!