Hey Courtney,

Just three weeks before our backyard wedding we decided not to risk a failed or stressful DIY project so we hired out our patio (we got a number of estimates to lock in the best price). But Nicole over at makingitlovely.com laid her own back patio and it came out amazing (so if you check in over there and search “patio” you’ll find her post about it). Hope it helps!

xoxo,
Sherry

Oh yeah, mulch is the big secret. It seems weird to waste time and money on glorified wood chips, but a nice thick layer makes everything look about 100 times better than before the application, and it keeps about 99% of the weeds out (and makes plucking any stragglers really easy too). It took us a while to learn the secret (and a whole lot of wasted weeding) but now that we’re privy to the magic of mulch we can’t wait to get ours down in the spring (preferably before any weeds start to make an appearance).

-John

Aw shucks guys. Thanks for the compliments, and stay tuned for other parts of the yard still in desperate need of a makeover.

-John

Howdy MIL (not mother in law, Making It Lovely)- Glad to help. We’ve totally had our share of misses when it comes to gardening, but once you find a few things that do really well and don’t look half bad (for us that’s Catmint and Dwarf Cavatine Pieris) it’s all about working them in wherever you can. We’re planning to bring some catmint into the front yard (and eliminate some of the other crazy colors going on there) and we’ve already introduced more Cavatine Pieris bushes on the side and in the front. Best of all, it looks cohesive and consistent, not lazy and safe (which it really is). Oh and a gorgeous pretty-hard-to-kill tree is a Japanese Maple… we’re too poor to buy more than one, but I thought I’d throw that out there for ya. You can get some pretty nice looking ones for about $50 at Lowe’s and they have that money back guarantee for a year so even if you manage to kill it (which would actually take some skill) you’d still get your moolah back.

Hey Colleen- The cute metal table and chairs were a total steal from target.com. They’re called the “Manhattan” table and chairs- the chairs come in sets of two while the table can be purchased on its own. I remember them having really good buyer feedback and I can attest to the fact that they’re well made and certainly worth the money. I also got ‘em during one of those free shipping promotions so you might wanna wait for one of those (they seem to happen every month or so) and since I saved some green there, paying to switch out the cushions didn’t seem so bad (I just picked up some tan ones at my local Target and sold the red ones at our garage sale). Hope that helps.

xo,
Sherry