Backyard Before and After Pics

Did I ever show y'all what our backyard used to look like when the boys were little? Well, here's a pic...

Yep, that's the same backyard. :) When we built this house almost 14 years ago, our boys were 6 and 1, so we made sure they had plenty of backyard space to run and play in. I knew that before long, the playset would come down and I could have a pretty backyard again. :) But, oh the fun we had in that backyard when the boys were little!

In the upper right of the pic below, you can see where the playground used to be. It was in that far back corner. Disclaimer...these pics were taken last summer when everything was green and blooming. It definitely doesn't look like this in January! :)




Here's looking straight on at that back corner. Back in the day, if you were to walk straight forward, you'd bump into a pirate ship. :) 



That arbor is right behind where the fort and slide used to be.



The pic below is pretty much from the same point of view as the first pic with the playground. My, it looks different now. :)



Y'all have heard me talk about this before, but this is the furniture my hubby made out of the wood from the playset. When they dismantled the playset, he kept a lot of the wood and used it to make these adirondack chairs and bench. It's so nice to still have a little piece of the playset back here. :)



This was the former home of a pirate ship, wave climber, fort, slide, and log cabin. Along with numerous motorized jeeps, fire trucks, play gas pumps, diggers, and hot wheels cars by the millions (and a cozy coupe or two) 





Here are a few more pics of the olden days...


Below, you can see there was nothing planted along the back fence yet. You can also get a little glimpse of the tiny bald cypress to the right of the log cabin. That's one of the fastest growing trees I've ever seen. You can see how the once red jeep was now bleached almost white from the sun. 

You can see the bald cypress is starting to get bigger.

Again...there was absolutely nothing along the back fence. :) We refrained from planting a lot of trees/bushes back then because we wanted the boys to have plenty of room for soccer, football, baseball, etc.

These are all pictures of a picture, so the quality isn't that great. 

You can see in the pic below that I finally started to plant a few things along the fence, but the playset was still getting daily use. By the way, that's one of the grandpas pushing someone around in a gigaball. Lol!

Then one day when the boys were a little older, we started the demolition of the beloved playset. The boys helped take it down. You can see I had already planted a few things in the background. A lot of that wood was about to be transformed into an adirondack chair and bench. :)

When my youngest was 10, he put together that arbor all by himself! We still have it today. 

Here's one more look at the playground in its prime. :) I spent many an hour sitting on that park bench watching the boys play. 

When we had the house built, we just marked off where the playground would go, so they wouldn't put grass down there. It was nice because we just put down some weed guard on top of the soil, then had the mulch delivered. The mulch we used is called "playground mulch." It's light colored so it won't stain and it provided a great cushion for all those little falls that took place. :) We did have to periodically bring in more mulch every couple of years or so, just to beef up the protection. 

Happy times, indeed! Thanks for going down memory lane with me!

~Lisa

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