back yard curb appeal

Originally, this was going to be about raised beds along the back of the house under the living and dining room windows. But, they were backordered. And still haven't arrived.
So instead, this is about adding another garden bed under the trees, planting bulbs and another lilac along the garage wall AND planting a sugar maple in the yard! The latter was planted near the small garden I started off the back of the large rock - in time, the grass between the garden and the tree will all turn into a roughly triangular shaped garden.

This is the sugar maple - which my Dad so nicely staked using old driveway guides for the snowplow guy (reduce, re-use, recycle!) - after he awesomely dig the hole for the tree!

This is the start of the garden behind the rock that will slowly grow towards the tree.

 This is the BEFORE where we started another garden under the larger trees in the yard.

This is AFTER. whew! so much work for not so much in the grand scheme of gardens, but it's a start!

 There is a combination of tall (above) and short/ground cover(below) phlox.

There is also some black eyed susans, 4 ft sunflowers and 6ft sunflowers in the bed behind the phlox. A former co-worker was cleaning out some of her (extensive!) gardens and so I got an eclectic grouping of plants. At first, I was going to spread them around the yard, but since I have no garden beds ready for them, Mum and I decided to put them all in one and move them in later years once they are more established.

This is our Well. Sad that it's greener than the 'lawn' around it right? sigh. In any case, I created a bit of a garden around it - maybe the flowers will distract from the green tube in the yard? The flowers are a combination of lupine and daylilies. The latter has larger leaves and orange flowers that can grow fairly tall, so I'm hoping it will a good disguise!

 Here is the garden I put in last year with 9 lilacs. Not all 9 made it, so another was added in (seen below) and then in between, Mum and I planted bulbs - mostly daffodils - to help fill out the bed until the lilacs grow a bit more. My plan, is to have that entire garage wall covered by the lilacs - it will take a few years. I know. But that is the goal!

It was a long day, but SO rewarding to look out into the yard and see progress!!