After writing the final check to our builders in early 2018, we laid low with Via Corona for most the year. It was nice to just hang out, let her settle (literally) and, you know, not hemhorrage money.
Our one major task for Via Corona in 2018 was to address the remaining strip of dirt that was our front and side yards.
Lest you have forgotten just how awful Via Corona’s yard began, allow me to refresh your memory. Though there isn’t much to it, when we moved in, Via Corona’s yard was derelict.
Though we encountered its destitution every time we visited the house, we somehow completely forgot to include it in our renovation plans.
Which turned out to be okay since TD and I watched a ton of YouTube videos and learned how to do some yard stuff.
You can see the entire madcap adventure (montage included) in our Working Har Har Hard on the Yard Yard Yard post.
We gave ourselves some serious back pats for our landscaping accomplishments and have continued to do so while we’ve kept everything alive.
YouTube learning (actually, let’s be honest, TD and I) has its limits however and alas, a significant portion of the yard remained, shall we say, au natural.
A couple of things were keeping us from moving forward. First, we needed an irrigation system and we needed to figure out if we could do it ourselves. I’ll cut to the chase tout suite. The answer was no. Like, NO! With that out of the way we had a second obstacle: our neighbors. We’ve got a leaning wall between the two properties. They’ve got a leaning fence. We wanted to pull down the wall and have a nice redwood fence built. They had some “concerns.” After several months and unsuccessful attempts at understanding their concerns in a way that would cost us less than $50,000, we gave up on that version of the plan. We’ve got bigger, badder ideas for that wall down the road and have decided to play the neighbor long game.
Obstacles out of the way, we had the irrigation and sod installed in something like 48 hours. Almost over night we went from “dirt patch alley” to “pass me a beer, where’s the corn hole?”
Cool slider alert:
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While we may have conceded (temporarily) on the long wall battle, we did win some view. We’re quick learners and when it came to the short wall, we didn’t consult with anyone and had the nice professionals open things up a bit for us.
Another cool slider alert:
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Via Corona has wrap-around grass. All my life’s wishes I didn’t know I had have been fulfilled.
Final cool slide alert:
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Of course, no good deed goes unpunished. The sod had been down less than a week before the gophers moved in. And then the skunks and raccoons started taking advantage of the worm-rich soil and regularly aerating the sod.
So, we’ve got that going for us, which is nice.
Want more Via Corona renovation stories? Of course you do: Via Corona The Remodel