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Monday, May 3, 2010

Backyard Inspiration: small spaces

I know you couldn't tell the scale from my backyard sketch on yesterday's post, but we have a small backyard.

From the back of the house, to the back fence is only 18.5'.  Our neighborhood is designed that way on purpose since we have acres and acres of greenbelts, play structures, 3 pools and a dog park here.  For me, I'm ok with the small backyard.  It's the perfect size canvas!

Now that the backyard demo has started, I've been scouring online photos to find elements I could add to our yard, based on our shape, our needs (we want grass finally!) and the size.

Here we have the inspirational photos I found so you can see my vision!
Enjoy the tour:

This curvy walkway, grass, and small planters at the grass line are a for sure MUST HAVE for our space.  The walkway to both side yards will run right along the house- we don't want to have to water plants right next to the house- you know, avoid as much wetting down of the siding as possible.  Maybe some container planting though?

No pool for us, but here are some more plants and grass features.  Plus, there are some great colors here, and the height variations are great.

This space is great because our patio set is this length, plus if you notice the built in BBQ to the left, that's in my plans as well.  Plus, in the paver patio, they've done another built in plant area.  Oh, and grass of course!

This photo has more pavers than we're looking at, but I like the small retaining wall for a height variation, and added seating for those BBQs.  I'm hoping to do some raised paver walls, if only in one area.

This photo I love because of the foliage at the fence line.  We plan to put a border of plants around the fence line, and this one really captured my attention!

Even though this is a digital plan, I love the small bench with the rock at foot near the upper left corner.  We'll add a bench at one of the fence lines, in direct site of the grass and the entire backyard!

We have sliding doors for our access to outside, but I'd love to eventually add french doors instead.  Either way, I love the rounded steps down to the main level, and the dark paver/brick look.

So I'm hoping to take my ideas from above, with my sketch I showed you yesterday, and create a backyard we ALL want to use, share, and enjoy :)


If you noticed, these photo inspirations aren't over the top!  They're real life, and they're really do-able, without breaking the bank (I think at least!)  My desire for our plans is to have the current patios demolished, and the cement removed.  Sprinklers can be laid by us, and then I'd have the canvas to create our backyard!

So, have any of you undertaken your backyard (or frontyard for that matter!) recently?  Anything you'd do differently, or suggest someone should CERTAINLY make sure they do?

I'm glad I've got some energy back now, because planning stuff like our backyard is what I live for!  (I even spied a great teak bench for the backyard at HomeGoods today for $129!  We CAN do this!)




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