Backyard birthday.

This past weekend we celebrated Emery's birthday by having some of our close friends come over for a party in our (newly re-done) backyard. When we bought our new house it was winter and there was still at least three feet of snow on the ground so we didn't know what to expect as far as landscaping and yard condition... and unfortunately there wasn't too much going on. A lot of patchy grass and weeds was basically what our backyard consisted of. Sort of a bummer, but hey, that just gave us total freedom to create whatever type of patio, deck, or entertaining area we wanted! We decided that the best remedy for patchy ugly grass was to build a big deck (obviously we could have also re-seeded it too, but there are just so many big trees in our area that it makes lush green grass very tricky to maintain, besides Emery is a total sucker for a building project.) So we spent the previous few weeks planning and building in hopes that maybe, just maaaaybe, we would have the backyard up to par by Emery's birthday weekend. Sometimes it just helps to have a deadline, even if it seems slightly unattainable, ya know?

Well guys, low and behold, we actually pulled it off! The backyard looks so much better and is actually so much more functional for entertaining now! I am so excited that we were able to get this done in time to still be able to enjoy spending some warm summer days out here. We had our first party this weekend and we dusted off our old film camera to document the occasion. We listened to music, ate cheese, drank wine and hung out with close friends on a gorgeous August summer evening.

(Psst... Emery also got pretty much the best birthday present ever: we got a hot tub! So we also did some late night hot tubbing as well.)