More mold and you...(more old and new)...

It's been a while, I think we painted two summers ago, but I thought it would be fun to have a whole collection of before and after shots of our house...if nothing else, so we can enjoy looking back at them all and be psyched on the progress we've made. Especially as we jump on into our next big project that will certainly eat up the rest of this year...!
So, when I moved in in Aug. 2005, and bought the house, in Feb. 2006, this was essentially what it looked like. I loved how the purple door matched the irises that would bloom for a few weeks a year.
In July, a year later, we had finally finished painting the house, adding a rain barrel, and re-landscaping the left front yard. Though I do miss the purple door when the irises bloom, I like our new terra cotta one, too!

At its worst, this is what the front of the house
(as you're looking at it, to the left of the door) used to look like.
Many Saturdays, long evenings, research hours, and rock hauls later...
this is our front yard now.

In the summer, the grass would always die--
the dogs (that's Bogey, Becca's former dog!) didn't mind...
But we didn't like the dead feeling so much.
We like living stuff a lot better
(so we brought in lifeless rocks, you wonder?!).

I considered adding some pictures of us hard at work, but those will come with our next project. Suffice it to say, Geoff and I learned SO much about sprinkler systems, labor involved in digging them in; about laying rock, and the hours involved in their transport; and the patience necessary in completing such a big project (that, I swear, was supposed to be just a month-long deal,
but turned into a year plus!!)
But the efforts have paid off...we love sitting on our steps at dusk, watching the water flow over the basalt in the fountain, and the dogs lap it up at their leisure!