Easy Yard Improvements!

A summer weekend is the perfect time to set aside time to make some inexpensive yard improvements that will help make your house look great. When it comes to lawn and landscape, it is the first thing people see when they approach your home. Whether you are trying to sell your home, dress it up a bit for company or you just enjoy making your outdoor space look its best, you may want to add these "quick fixes" to your weekend "to do" list.

• Prune - or remove - those overgrown bushes. Do you have out-of-control bushes? Often, problem bushes can be found in the foundation plantings of homes, right outside windows. While they may have once looked nice and proportional to the house, bushes can take over after several years. If this sounds like your house, take a deep breath and grab the hedge trimmer, loppers, and even a tree saw and spend some quality time with the shrubs. If you really believe your bushes are beyond control, don't hesitate to cut them down to the bottom and dig them out by the roots. Starting over is sometimes the best course of action. Flowering bushes should be trimmed right after they flower. Evergreen bushes can be trimmed any time this summer or fall.
• Color things up with annual plants. Annual flowers - the kind you have to replant each year because they don't come back on their own like perennials - can create perfect accent points for your home. They are inexpensive, and they make an immediate difference to your home's appearance. You can plant them in inexpensive clay pots or something more ornate depending on your taste and home style. Place pots of various sizes at your front entrance, or line a walkway with a colorful selection that is appropriate for the amount of sunshine that area receives. There is an annual flower to suit any purpose. The National Gardening Association's official site is a great place for learning more about flowering plants.
• Add mulch. Bark or wood chip mulch is a favorite landscape medium. It gives you instant gratification for an investment of a couple hours of work. Spread two or three inches of mulch in flower beds, being sure not to mound it up against the plants. Around tree trunks, add mulch in a "donut" shape - pull it back from the bottom of the tree trunk, never mound it against the tree. Mulch creates a finished appearance, helps smother weeds and retains moisture for your plants.
• Edge your sidewalks, trim your lawn. A well kept lawn is actually the first step in creating a beautiful yard. Once you mow your lawn, follow-up with trimming to really make the yard look well-groomed. Edge your sidewalks and driveway to create clean lines and eliminate that scraggly look of grass blades overlapping concrete or asphalt. At the same time, pull weeds or grass that has encroached in sidewalk or patio cracks. If you pull sand out of the cracks with the weeds, replace what's missing from a small bucket you keep handy. You also can use a weed killer to keep up with unruly growth on hard surface areas.
• Fix bare patches in the lawn. Summer is not the best time to seed your lawn, but you can fix those small bare spots successfully with a roll or two of sod. Just remember to lay the sod properly (For more tips, check out our how-to video on Laying Sod). Keep it moist until it takes root in your yard.
• Add a flower bed. It's never too late to add a flower bed this summer. Flower beds are always in transition - they are not a static landscape feature. If you carve out your flower bed now, you can plant perennial flowers that will have a few months to get established. Next year, they will come back bigger and better with proper care. The bonus here is that perennial plants go on sale as the summer season progresses. Here are the basics: Mark out the area for your garden bed (using spray paint to outline it). Kill the existing vegetation with a spray weed killer - read application directions carefully and don't allow the spray to touch grass or plants you want to save. Within about two weeks you will be able to rake away/pull out the dead vegetation and
  prepare the soil for planting.

Spend a weekend making some easy yard improvements. The feeling of pride you'll get will make putting your feet up at the end of the day feel that much better.