Landscaping, Continued

This weekend we (and by we, I mean Brian) added some trees to our yard. It's all looking so pretty!





The tree in the corner of each rounded bed is this a Cleveland Flowering Pear, which will look like this when it matures a little more:



Then on the sides for some privacy we planted some of these:



And finally on the other side there's one of these:




And of course, how do the dogs show us they love what we did? They lay all over it:









Brian taking a much-deserved break to enjoy lunch on our new patio:

Rock's done...now what?

It's time for plants. After finishing the rock and the patio yesterday, we went to Lowe's (thanks for the coupons mom). Here's what we came home with:



Step #1- Create something plants could live in. As you saw in previous pictures, our yard was sand. So we got potting soil, manure and compost to create a liveable ground. Here's Brian doing the back-breaking work while I was making lunch and putting a chicken soup on the stove. If it's any good I'll post the recipe.


Step #2: Get planting. We plan on adding some shade trees in the corners, but we wanted to only get what we could feasibly finish, so trees coming later.




Proof that I worked and just didn't take pictures of Brian:




Here's something really cool about our patio. This picture was taken at 2 p.m. and this is as much sun as it gets because it's shaded by the house:


That's it for now. I'll post more pics as things start to bloom and grown.

Weekend improvements - part 2

We got about 90% of the way done with the rock last weekend, but we didn't have enough for one side alleyway along the house. We had dinner with our neighbors earlier this week, and they said they were planning on rocking their side alleys this weekend, so we were able to get in on their delivery.

So here is what 3 tons of rock looks like. Last week we had 7.


And here's what is going on in our yard right this minute (yes I'm blogging while B works)


We will be able to sit outside and enjoy the view on our new patio in two days. And no - I did not carve my initials in it like I did the house slab. :-)

We start landscaping the flower beds later this afternoon, so more pics to come soon.

Funny story - I was chatting with one of the concrete guys about KB leaving, and he said "didn't I see you on the news the other night?" Hee hee - I'm famous.

My TV news debut

Here is the story they ran last week. We shot it in front of our house.

Rocking the Yard, Day 1

Here is what our backyard looked like prior to 9 a.m. this morning (our yard is at the bottom - I realized I never took a pic of the yard because there wasn't much to show; but this will give you the general idea - a giant doggie sandbox)



I am still not used to the lack of grass around here. That being said, we tackled a big project today - starting to rock the yard. I felt bad because I had a meeting in Santa Fe so I wasn't able to help until almost 4 p.m. Brian and his friend did a fabulous job, and I was so surprised at how much they got done. We had 7 tons of rock delivered in front of our house at 9 a.m., and here's how the yard looked at 5:30.

We installed a decorative stone border across the back wall and in two half-circles at the corners. This will eventually be home to some trees, flowering plants and bushes (and maybe even a small vegetable garden).

KB is bailing on New Mexico...and homeowners

I recently posted on a local Albuquerque blog site about our builder (KB Home). They recently announced that they are leaving the state. Initially they said they would finish all projects, but they later clarified the statement to say they would finish the homes under contract. This leaves residents like us wondering:
1) How long will the empty lots remain empty?
2) What will be done to control the dust from those empty lots?
3) If and when the lots are sold to another builder, will that builder have to adhere to our community's design standards? Will they be in the same price bracket as our community to prevent negative effects on our home's value?

KB won't call anyone back - even the people running our homeowner's association. As you all know, KB was less than pleasant to deal with during our building (the crazy outlet that kept jumping all over the wall for four months, the A/C in the wrong place, a lack of mailbox for two months, etc. etc.) That being said, I'm not surprised they aren't very responsive now, but I feel like they owe their current homeowners some explanations and so far they haven't given us any.

Fast forward to today - guess my post generated some interest because I just got called by a local reporter and she's coming to the house tonight.

Keep your fingers crossed that it does something.

Some updates to the house

We've been slowly but steadily making changes here and there.

MASTER BATHROOM

Here are the new fixtures in the master bath. We replaced the lights and sink fixtures with these. The faucets were a steal-of-a deal at Lowe's. We found them on clearance and even negotiated the price (we had no idea they negotiated - but it's only on clearance stuff).

MASTER BEDROOM

And my favorite changes - the master bedroom. I've always wanted a red bedroom, and when we found this comforter set on clearance at Linens N' Things, we decided to go ahead and do it. We're planning on painting sometime soon as well.

Before:

After:

Even the dogs got a new bed. Of course, this is the last piece of bedding we'll be buying them for a while since they ate their old one.