Now that the pool construction is finally done, it’s time to start making the backyard pretty. First up was a new fence. Our old one was falling down and wouldn’t have passed the pool inspection anyway. Here’s what our side yard looked like during construction:

You can actually see the old fence pulled off in the upper right side of the picture. As you can see the construction pretty much destroyed the yard. This is the main entrance into our backyard so we wanted to make something special.

We decided to build an arbor integrated into the new gate. Isn’t it absolutely stunning?  For the fence, the hubby integrated this premade lattice on top of plain old fence boards to dress it up.

I love how the arbor perfectly frames out the new pool house. Eventually, there will be vines growing up in the arbor.

We also built a ground-level deck walkway (what we call The Boardwalk) to connect the front of the house to the new pool house.

Behind the fence houses our trashcans and new HVAC units. There will also be a lattice on this side to block their view from the boardwalk.

Fences are expensive, so to save a little money we built just a standard plain fence for the sides.

I created shade gardens on both sides of the boardwalk with hydrangeas and hostas.

Eventually, we will build a small bridge over the stepping stones to attach the boardwalk to the new pool decking.

On the left side of the house, we built a matching gate with out the arbor.

This is one of my favorite spots in the yard. Just look at the size of that hosta!

So what do you think about our new fence? Our neighbors have been stopping by to tell us how much they like it. Once the wood acclimates properly (maybe in the fall or next spring) we plan to stain the fence a darker brown and the boardwalk grey. I’ll share more pictures as the plants start to mature as well!