Having a Garden after over 9 years in a flat,
has been the best thing about moving into our house last year.
It has been our favourite place to spend our evenings, especially when we’ve had a little bit of sun and we have really been cracking on out there, since my last post about it.
We can’t believe how different it looks now!

We moved in to our house in June 2015 and it was such a bonus to have a garden.
Having this little space of our own to enjoy, has been fantastic.
Little B loves playing out there (he has a house, paddling pool and now football goal-so he’s in heaven) and we have had some great chilled out days/evenings with family and friends and some fun BBQs over the last year.
We have our own space finally to fully enjoy and have loved discussing all the different ways we could make it our little Haven!

It has taken a lot of hard slog, mostly from B I must admit.
Many bonfires, trips to the dump and building work
as well as constant pottering, weeding and watering
and LB has loved getting fully involved at every milestone.

In addition to the big work of ripping out trees/bushes/shrubs, pulling down paving slabs and replacing with sleepers and replacing fence panels…..

we’ve spray painted lanterns, the BBQ and our Chiminea to give them a new lease of life.

B built our ‘Summer House’ at the back of the garden
(i know its only a glorified shed but i love it!)
It needed quite a bit of TLC as it had seen some bad flooding, it was stood near the River Thames at his Nan’s caravan for years.
He had to level the ground, replace rotten wood, make sure it was all sturdy as it had a few overlaps due to the wood swelling,
as well as re-felting the roof and giving it a lick of paint.
He even built a little bit of decking at the front and a step to cover the gap underneath (due to the levelling off-our garden is on a slope), we then added its own little picket fence for some decoration.  Its amazing that something so simple can transform the overall picture.

Apparently having the right equipment is crucial in situations like this – well as he has a van and a shed full of tools, both handheld and electrical as well as  safety equipment for his job as a plumber I thought we were sorted, but it seems there is always more to add to the collection.  Great places to look for all the right bits are
Engelbert Strauss and your local B&Q.

B is pretty good with his hands so he made it all look easy and Little B loved assisting with everything-as you can imagine this made every process a little slower
but a heap more fun (well for me as a spectator anyway)!

I planted my first ever hanging baskets and window box to give it that extra something and we have a sofa inside (though the rest of the inside needs some work still).
I have a few ideas of how to make it a little pretty colourful area for me to chill and work in and B has his ideas for a man cave
-we are still discussing!

We planted more shrubs and flowers and got some gorgeous new pots.
We spent hours choosing our favourites at Davies Brothers Garden Centre and seriously could have spent a fortune.

We added some fun little ornaments and a feature wall on one of our patio fences. We’ve spent hours searching for the right things on Schpok and found a few pieces in Dunelm.
I had to delete the Schpok App after B started getting a bit too carried away.

Its been hard work though and unfortunately we don’t seem to be having the glorious summer so far to fully enjoy it but we are pleased with how far it has come!

We have always been useless at keeping plants alive but we have some truly beautiful things happening out there and we are both so proud of what we’ve achieved and already have some ideas to make it better next year.
But for now we are going to sit back and enjoy ……..
and start thinking about what room to do first inside the house.

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