ouch 
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Too harsh?
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Slightly hypocritical - I’ve been that gardener.
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What do you want out of the space? From what you’ve written, I see a space for kiddo to get gloriously messy and a spot for you and Mr.Meer relaxing. Do you want an eating space? Conversation grouping for more than 2? Maybe a workspace for when it’s nice out?
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I blame Mr. Meer entirely for the mismatched pots, he’s got something against in-ground gardening. 
The raised bed is our view from the porch. I actually want to rehome them all to the left-most circle in the Phase 2 picture.
If we do the composite decking the weeds will just grow up in between those too. The pavers I have in mind are 18"x18" (0.45x0.45 meters) so there will be fewer gaps. If we had a deck raised above the ground a bit to deprive the dirt of sunlight I’d be more in favor of it. The weeds growing up through rocks and laughing at me have slightly affected my opinion in this regard.
Inside hammocks have 453% more usable days in my region. Proven fact.
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I think it’s too cramped for an eating space, if it were the usual table and four chairs set up.
Yes, messy space for Kiddo plus one adult (he could be out by himself but generally insists on company).
Workspace is definitely an idea, we just rejiggered our internet and have better reception out there now I think.
Sometimes we have friends over for grilling so several people hang out to observe the meat and hang out with the grill master, they tend to be larger guys so maybe a third chair would be good instead of just two chairs plus storage-footstools, hmm. I forgot about grilling, what with the plague and all.
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If the inside rocking chairs can be indoor materials, we like the poang rocking chair. Choose your own cushion
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Okay coming in with some retrospective costs on the hot tub!
We ended up spending about $300 on the Saluspa Hawaii, plus another $300 or so on additional insulation and chemicals, so about $600. (Even the cheapest fully insulated hot tubs seem to be around $5000 so this is a great deal for us).
It looks like we’re saving about $10/month in water from taking fewer baths and spending around $40/month in electricity. The tub says it’s not supposed to be used under 40 degrees - we used it comfortably down to about 30 but are currently having a very cold snap and we turned it way down and aren’t using it until the temp comes back up. Living where we live though, this means we can use it nearly year round for around $30/month (although I’m thinking that’ll go way down in the summer so maybe even less). We added more insulation in the middle of the period so it may end up being even less once we have it fully insulated to our liking.
We use it probably 5 times a week and it’s been great for our mental health, so I’m really glad we got it and grateful for this thread for pushing us over the edge!
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I’m so happy you’re loving it! Yea!!
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Would love to resurrect this thread to see if you all have any advice! We have an open space that gets a lot of sun between our dog run and sheds, and I want to put in raised beds here. What color/shade wood (or other materials) would you use for the beds?
And, the question that keeps me up at night: any advice on what to put down on the ground underneath (edit: and around) the bed? Since this area gets so much foot traffic, the grass is trashed. I thought I wanted mulch, but it’s looking more expensive than I thought it would be for the nicer-looking mulch?
Including the same space from a few different angles.
What’s your climate?
We’re in Colorado, so 5b. Dry, clay-y soil, and we have a decent amount of 90+ degree days every summer.
I didn’t put anything under my raised beds. Just filled them directly over the existing grass.
So it’s less feeling like I need to, and more making it look nice, so it’s not just a weedy mess where I walk around the beds. I’ll edit, because I could have been clearer.
I would border the raised beds with pavers, either just basic ones right up against each other or going fancy with the pavers offset with stones. I would make paths to and from the beds as well and then create some flowerbeds scattered around.
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I have an update! @Marcela i just love the idea of putting up flower beds on the sides.
We had tree pruners come about a week ago, and it made a big difference in how our yard feels.
Just one part of the yard, before:
And after:
The angle of the pic makes the angle of the tree on the right look wonky, but it looks great and even in person. Please excuse my dirty windows!
Next, I diagrammed out where I want to go. Black ink = current state, green ink = what I want to do this year. I know my handwriting is bad, so the takeaways are: we have a huge backyard, and I want to put in garden beds, add a sitting area, and put in a section of native plants.
This is a zoomed in diagram of what I want to do with the raised beds in the short term, not to scale:
There is a lot of yard junk between the future raised beds area and the fence, but I would love to put flower beds in along the fence once we’re rolling.
First step was to take out the sod where the raised beds and native plants will go. We did that yesterday! It was very hard and I have never felt so proud of myself in my life. I am double posting this in garden chat, but here they are:
With plastic until we do the next steps:
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(Post was getting wonky with all the pics, so adding a new post for next steps)
From here, for the raised beds area, we need to fix an electric line that we cut yesterday with the sod cutter (oops!), and then put in stepping stones for the path, put in something to contain the mulch, put down mulch, build the beds, fill them with dirt, and plant our veggies.
For the native plants area, I want to border the outside with stone, see if there is any more soil prep I need to do, and then plant them once they get here on 5/21.
Our design minded friend helped us think about the color scheme, and we’ll do light or medium brown mulch, sleek grey flagstones for the stepping stones and native plants border, and natural wood for the beds.
Making progress!
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Soooo hype about these changes!! Already looks SUPER different.
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You’ve done a ton of work already!
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