Year of the Yard: Part 2

This whole yard project is turning out to be a little bit more involved than I first anticipated. I told myself that I would be done with everything by Mallory's birthday, March 17th. I have moved that back to Nolan's birthday, June 14th. Why an extra 3 months? I could give you a million reasons, but here are a few:
1. Rain, rain and more rain...makes it hard to do yard work, but does wonders for the garden.
2. Two children. I thought I would get a lot done during nap time, but as of a few weeks ago Nolan is nap-free. But gives me less time to do outside stuff.
3. The flu. It put me down for a good week and a half.
4. Lower back injury. The rock digging didn't help, and neither did lifting 2-year olds all day

I could probably go on, but let me share with you the things that HAVE been accomplished:
Grass is filling in my bald spots!! Only one more little patch, and it is looking better by the day. The rain has been helping a lot.

Planted strawberries! Put each individual one in sections of cinderblocks that we had in the backyard. We got about 5 really early in the season, and the birds ate the rest. They were a good snack and super sweet.

Our garden! It's really taking off and has a ton of blooms on it right now. Very excited to start getting veggies and fruit. Here's a list of what we planted: yellow crookneck squash, zucchini, cucumber, tomatillo, jalapenos, green peppers, a lot of tomatoes (in pots, not in the photo), basil and cilantro (not in photo), and my favorite: a blackberry bush! We put the blackberry bush against a tressil to see if it would grow up, but hasn't gotten really huge yet. It does have about 15 blackberries on it though!

And last, but not least, my huge rock project. I could never have imagined so many rocks could fit in such a small area. I'm probably digging down between 6 to 8 inches and can't believe what a pain it is. I guess after so many years the rocks and dirt have really compressed together and it is making it very hard to actually dig up. Very tedious...but will be worth it (hopefully). I'm probably 3/4 of the way done, maybe even more. I think I've decided to go with stone. I was leaning towards wood decking, but thought that might be too hard to get everything level and exact. If I use stones, it will give me a little bit more leeway for error. If anyone would like to donate stones/bricks to my project I would greatly appreciate it :)

I will hopefully update you with the finished project soon!