Landscaping...Again

When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. Well, when life gives you 50% off to Ted Lare you spend it! Justus and I had been saying we wanted to put mulch and plants in on the south side of the house. The sun is so hot on that side of the house, so the grass doesn't grow well (the cement foundation also heats things up). Landscaping this area seemed like a good solution. Our goal was to do this next spring. Well... one morning we got that email with 50% off and it was meant to be! We needed to replace some sod that Century Link so nicely killed (*sarcasm*) and some by the deck that didn't come in well. We used the sod by the house to replace these areas and then got to work mulching and planting by the house. All-in-all it worked out great! This time I mean it- no more landscaping projects until next Spring! The amount we have spent on mulch this year I could have had a very expensive purse! 

Here are some before and after pics of our project, including some pics of our praying mantis!

Fun time at Ted Lare picking out plants (Little Lime Hydrangea)

The tall grass didn't fit in the car well. "Buckle up kids!"

Before- no mulch and dry grass

Before- Notice the grass can't grow under the AC

Before from farther back

"Before": In this earlier project we used the wrong grass. This pampas grass is too floppy,
so switched it for more upright grass. 

Me thinking: Weird leaf stuck to the house. Me speaking: WOW! That is NOT a leaf! 

According to Wikipedia after some lovin' the female eats the males head off. Notice the head in the females mouth. #GirlPower

The massive praying mantis on the move. Cool! 

Below are the after pictures. We moved the "floppy grass" to the new section, added in a Little Lime Hydrangea (Ted Lare), Eastern Snowball (Lowe's), and nine bags of mulch (Lowe's). Note the hydrangea is titled "little." The nice lady at Ted Lare showed us the non-little version and it was the size of an elephant. Settled on little and in this case, little still means big. As for the Eastern Snowball I saw 50% off and "Big, white, snowball shaped flowers with red leaves in the fall" at Lowe's. I thought, wow how pretty and perfect. I should have read more than the 50% off sticker and brief description because it ends up it gets to be 12 feet tall and 10 feet wide! Eeeks...trimming will be needed. In my defense, it was 50% off! At least I read the tag before planting or in a few years I would be amazed by our giant plant. 

Mid-project. Justus is such a hard worker.
He moved all the old sod to new places and cut a perfect line for our new flower bed.

After: We split this big thing of grass so it would cover more of the electrical box.
It will fill out over time by getting taller and wider. This grass remains upright, so shouldn't cover the walkway. 

After! 

Pampas grass and little lime hydrangea

Eastern Snowball and pampas grass