Frugal Deck and Backyard Landscaping

This hub includes pictures of how to build a low maintenance backyard with your small budget.

Other advice on decorating your bedroom on a budget and saving money on your heating cost. Remember a penny saved is a penny earned.

Use wooden shutters for wainscoting in your hallway.

Use aluminum cans to make an awesome picture frame.

More DIY projects to save money in your home.

This is a Do-It-Yourself- Project that you can do to save money with awesome results.

Suzzycue started by taking a weed-eater to the whole backyard under the top wooden deck. The grass was so thick and up to her waist, that a lawn mower was out of the question. Also there was a ditch that collected water near the front wall of the fence. This was a great place to recycle the weeds and grass cuttings.

TIP: You must wear long pants when weed whacking to prevent bugs and grass from hitting your legs.

Suzzycue took the back side of an ax and knocked every other board out of the front of the fence. Marylou's wish and Suzzycue loves to whack things. This gave the impression of a much larger yard and brought in her mountain view. A nicer view to see than a board fence.

The whole backyard was then covered with landscaping cloth to prevent the weeds from growing back. Landscaping cloth is not a permanent fix for weeds but it will work for a time.

The wall was taken down with a crowbar and pounded from the back again with the axe. Once down on the ground the wall was pulled over four feet on the other side of the cement pad and leveled up with a two x four frame and stained. Always use what you have. The wall made a great deck and also let the sun under the deck in the morning to dry the morning dew.

We only had one load of supplies delivered from Lowes. The rest of the building supplies we delivered ourselves in Marylou's PT Cruiser. There was 2x4's,patio stones, three bags of cement,20 bags of topsoil and 30 bags of mulch to spread around. The three rolls of of landscaping cloth went down first and covered the whole backyard.

The twenty bags of topsoil was spread over the landscaping cloth to hold it in place and also stop the red mulch from sliding down the back yard slant. The backyard slanted all the way from the patio doors to the ditch then up the other side of ditch.

There were four red patio stones set into the front of the cement pad to increase the size of the pad. The cement pad was stained red to match the wooden deck. TIP:Always prime cement before staining it or it will peel off. Then there was a path made with rubberized garden edging we used in the footpath to prevent sliding on the path. This worked well for Marylou to walk confidently to her bridge.

A set of smaller patio stones and three larger cement blocks were set deeper into the backyard slant to make small steps to get to Marylou's lower yard and the bridge. The bridge floor and the railing were painted red to match the paint job of the upper deck. The bridge was set into place over the ditch and we were so grateful for the neighbor who donated it to us. The ditch was then planted with different kinds of ground covers and more of them will eventually be planted next spring to cover the whole back yard. The thirty bags of red mulch is covering the ground to prevent weeds from coming back until the spring planting.

The gate and post caps were painted red to give the fence some color without painting the whole fence. The fence will eventually be covered with climbing rose bushes. Did you notice the view through the front fence looks better with every other board removed?

The deck had to be cleaned and Suzzycue stained it a solid red stain to cover the minor age defects of an older deck. Marylou wanted the railing stained to match. This deck color is also the same as the below deck.

A Gazebo was brought and hauled home in the Pt Cruiser but we had the furniture delivered. TIP: If you buy the floor model of a Gazebo,at the end of the summer season, you get a big discount because they don't want to pack it up. But beware there were no directions on how to put it together and what fun that was...NOT LOL.

The ten foot square octagon Gazebo turned out to be twelve feet in some places so was a very tight squeeze to put it together on her deck.

The Rattan couch and two armchairs with the little coffee table were made for this octagon Gazebo.

This is the view from the outside of the gate. The whole finished project gave Marylou two places to relax, out of the sun, that were wasted, hardly used spaces before.

Yes, you did realize Marylou's favourite color is red and after this project we are still friends today. LOL .