Let’s Landscape the Front Yard! Zone 1

Do you have any Hosta plants? If you do, you know those babies grow like crazy! When we moved into the house in 2001, the flower bed along the sidewalk in the front of our house had rose bushes and Hosta plants. We transplanted the rose bushes to the back yard, leaving the Hostas alone in the flower bed. They loved the extra space and it wasn’t long before they had grown enough to touch each other.

The picture on the left is the front flower bed after removing the rose bushes. You can imagine that having rose bushes right next to the sidewalk was not the best location due to the thorns and such. My son and I had just installed the red brick edging when this picture was taken. The picture on the right is how the Hosta bed looked just before I started this project. You can’t even SEE the red bricks!

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Over the years, I have divided these plants many times. The first time was to add some to the backyard flower beds – there are 11 plants in there. The next year, I divided them and planted them in the East flower beds creating 10 new plants. After that, I had run out of transplant areas so I started giving them to friends about every other year so they have been divided no less than 10 times. If you don’t have any Hosta plants and want some hearty, large-leaved plants, you can’t go wrong with these. They love the shade but have adapted well in the backyard where the sun shines on them most of the day.

It’s been a couple of years since the Hostas in the front flower bed have been divided so they have outgrown their space. It’s already too late in the season to divide them easily, so we decided to enlarge the flower bed by removing some of the lawn. Hubby thought 18″ would be sufficient but I ended up taking up 24″ of sod since I was measuring from the brick line and not the edge of the Hosta leaf line. I’m sure I could have removed more sod as the plants seem to have grown more in the few weeks since I started on this project.

For your convenience, I have created a free printable with pics, Supply List & Instructions for you!

There are sod cutters you can rent but I’ve always just pulled the sod up by hand. Sometimes it comes up pretty easy and other times, it’s a bit of a struggle. I’ve found that if the grass and dirt are a bit moist, the job is easier. If there are trees close by and you run into small roots that are intertwined with the soil, it is more difficult. I keep a small garden cutting tool with me to cut those viney roots away from the soil as I’m pulling up the sod.

To begin the process, I outline the area where I’ll be removing the sod by laying a yardstick on the ground to use as a guide for the size of space I need – super fancy, huh? I did use a garden hose to mark where I was enlarging the main section of the flower bed since it wasn’t going to be a straight line. Once the line is marked, I use a garden shovel to cut through the sod to the soil, making that cut about 2″ deep. Once that is done, I use the shovel to cut the length into 1′ sections; doing so creates pieces that are easy to remove and use in a new location. To remove the sod, using a garden knee pad, I get down on my knees and use a small garden rake to pry the sod from the ground. As each piece is loose, I place it in my garden wagon and when the wagon is full, I take it to a location where I can store the sod until the project is finished.

As you can see in the pictures below, the Hostas were so large, the red brick edging was no longer visible.

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After I removed the sod and set it aside. I removed the red brick border and took the 40+ bricks to the backyard to be used at some other time. Little did I know that ‘some other time’ would be soon!

Once the Hosta bed was enlarged, I thought it would be nice to continue the process with the rest of the front flower bed. The sod in front of the Hostas came up in nice, intact pieces but the closer I got to the large front yard tree, the more difficult it was to remove the sod due to the tree roots being close to the surface. I used my little garden cutting tool a lot!

When all the sod was removed from the flower bed, it was time to add a new brick edging. I wanted to use grey this time so I went shopping to see what the choices were. One of the local builders’ supply stores had an interesting option, called a bullet brick. I liked that look and that they would work well edging around curves, plus, they were on sale for $1.19 so I bought 40. I would end up having to buy a few more to finish this section of the project (as you’ll find out, what started out as the Hosta project, morphed into a full-on Front Yard Refab).

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At first, I thought I’d lay the bricks on their side but then realized that with the height of the grass, I would lose the decoration on the top of the bricks, so I flipped them to have the decoration facing up. I’m always amazed at how hard it is to create a straight line when edging grass. Course, if I marked the area first (like hubby suggested) as opposed to just using a yardstick, I’m sure it would be easier. With the bricks in place, it was time to add soil to raise the height of the ground to match the existing flower bed depth. Before adding the soil, I laid down some newspaper to help keep the weeds at bay. I read about this on some landscaping sites as an economical and environmentally friendly option. From what I read, you lay it down and wet it well then add the soil. It’ll be interesting to see how it works! I already had the newspaper, so this ended up being free….and when I say free, I mean free. We cancelled our subscription long ago but after a few months, we started getting it again. Although we’ve called to tell them we canceled, the paper shows up regularly anyway 🙂

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Loving the look! As I said a bit ago, taking up the sod from the rest of the flower bed was not as easy as it was in front of the Hosta plants so it took longer. One of the reasons I decided to enlarge that section of the beds was because of the tree roots; they are so close to the surface that the grass doesn’t grow well in that area. Also, the way the bed was shaped, made mowing more difficult and the plants were outgrowing the space anyway.

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With the sod removed, I laid down the rest of the newspaper I had on hand then used some landscape cloth that was left over from the backyard project last year. It’ll be a study in which method abates weeds better! Next step was laying the brick and filling the space with soil to match the existing flower bed level. I had 3 stepping stones in the old flower bed so the yard could be accessed from the east side of the porch. Now that the bed was larger, I needed to add more. I had the two 8″ x 12″ cement ones, also left over from the backyard project, but I needed more. The store where I bought the round aggregate one years ago no longer carries them but I did find square ones at another location and bought two which gave me a total of 7 stepping stones. To set the stones, I removed a bit of the new soil so they would sit down just a bit and be level.

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Because the tree roots run under this flower bed, instead of trying to plant flowers, I decided to use planters. I had a metal oval planter in my garden supply stash and then bought 4 metal ones at Walmart that I found in their home section. They are containers to be used when entertaining were actually less than the price of actual planters. I bought 2 square ones, 1 large tub and 1 oval one. Their prices ranged from $6.48 to $9.98. I drilled a few holes in the bottom of each then planted some petunias that Lowe’s had on sale – 12″ pots for $5 ea! Such a deal!!

The front garden looks fabulous! The next Zone in this Front Yard Refab is to do something around the front tree. Our lawn is not flat and mowing around that tree is difficult. I needed to do something! You can see the ‘after’ in these pictures. (Before pic is below the Supply & Instruction lists)

Supplies Used

• Garden Shovel
• Garden rake
• Garden cutter
• Wagon
• Newspaper
• Landscape cloth
• 2 stepping stones @ $2.50 ea = $5
• 46 Grey Bullet Bricks @ $1.19 ea = $55
• Top soil @ $1.88 = $18.80
• 2 sm/2 lg bags Miracle Grow $47
• 4 Containers for flowers $38
• 6 12″ pots of Petunias @ $5 ea = $30

Instructions

• Measure the size of the area where you are removing sod
• Mark with a line or garden hose or use a yardstick
• Using a garden shovel, cut through the soil along the line for the new area
• Pull up the sod and set aside
  • You can use the shovel to loosen the sod or a small garden rake
• Use edging bricks to line the new area
• Lay down either newspaper or landscape cloth
• Cover with soil to the depth you want – 2-3″
• Set potted plants in the location of your choice
• Set steppings stones by moving a little soil so they are buried just a bit

Remember to grab your free Supply List & Instructions for this project – Get it here!

Next up….Zone 2

Thanks for reading! If you love this project, let me know in the Comment section below! Feel free to share with your peeps on Social Media!

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