Family Reunion (May, 2021)

We have been able to see my parents, our kids and grandbaby during the Pandemic by taking thorough precautions, but we have not seen Steve's parents for 17 months.  So this Mother's Day was a very special one!  Steve's brother and our sister-in-law were heading to Lake Havasu on vacation, and were kind enough to bring Steve's parents along.  We all met at our nieces house in Mesa the day they arrived in town.  What a reunion it was!  We enjoyed a wonderful afternoon of swimming and some great take-out Chinese food for dinner.

We all had a great time seeing each other for the first time in a long time!  This was also the first time we have seen our nieces new house, even though they have lived here longer than we have.

Time to Start Enjoying!

 We are fully vaccinated, and the projects are coming to an end.  It seems like perfect timing! We are hoping that life is ready to restart and welcome us with open arms!  

So for now, we'll just start out slow and see where life takes us from here.

Gravel

 How we spent our winter, Part 9.

This is the day we have been waiting for!  Our gravel is arriving, and the last step of our landscaping journey is about to be complete!

It took seven huge truckloads and 192 yards of gravel for the front and back yards.  

It's time for the dust to settle, and for us to get back to life!

Lighting

How we spent our winter, Part 8.

Once the irrigation guys were all done, we had to dig up the yard one last time, for the lighting.  It's truly no longer winter, it is now April, but this is our last project before laying down the gravel and calling our yard a wrap. We got to be a really good team at digging.  Steve runs the electric jackhammer and or pick and Andra shovels out the loose soil.  Our neighbors commented several time how fast we were!

Path lighting.

You can see the path lights are in, and we are starting to put in the spot lights.

All done and tested, now we just have to fill in all of the trenches.

Our last big yard project is complete!  We just need to cover everything with gravel, and we'll be done!

Irrigation

 How we spent our winter, Part 7.

Somehow we got away without documenting the planting of our backyard, but all of the plants are in, and we're leaving the watering of them up to the experts (Complete Irrigation Systems. LLC).  They put in a great system for us, and we even remembered to document where all of the trenches are.  

We'll have to tear up the yard one more time for the lighting, but that should be it.

Plants

How we spent our winter, Part 6. 

While the landscapers were working on the travertine in the backyard, Steve and I were busy planting the plants in the front yard.  

We did a large plant and tree order from Home Depot, and were able to get them delivered directly from the wholesale nursery to our house.  Once they arrived, we started out by placing them where we thought we wanted them, just to make sure we were happy with it.  When you do your own landscape design, it's helpful to get a visual before you start putting them in the ground.

Once we were happy with the locations, we started digging...with a jackhammer of course!

It took us three full days to plant the front yard.  We are super pleased with the finished product!  Now we will need to hand water until the irrigation company gets here in about 2 weeks.

We also bought some fruit trees from our favorite local nursery (Desert Horizons), and planted them on the east side of our house.  Morning sun and afternoon shade is helpful for them in the hot desert.

We still have to purchase and plant the back yard, but we are definitely getting there!

Travertine

 How we spent our winter, Part 5.

Another job we knew we couldn't do on our own was the travertine to match the pool edging, so again, we hired this work out to Las Perlas.  They did the travertine, turf and fire pit.

They make it look so easy, but we know the truth!  So many hours of work went into this masterpiece.  We never could have done this on our own.

There is still a long way to go on the back yard, but at least we have a place where we can sit and relax.  We haven't really had that since we moved in almost a year ago (We were gone to Wsshington for the summer last year).