Hellstrip

Did you know that the strip of land between the sidewalk and the street is sometimes referred to as the hellstrip?  Just one of the many useful things I've learned on Pinterest.  Since we moved into this house, our hellstrip has been a mess.  It was grass and some unattractive bushes and we've just never been good at maintaining lawns.  This summer we let the grass entirely die out (which I am sure our neighbors appreciated) and this fall we played chicken with the weather to install some new landscaping before the rains set it.

Here's what our hellstrip looked like at the end of the summer.

Pretty dismal, I know. So we rented this tiller and then it was full-on dust bowl.

Seriously, it's been so drought-y this summer that it was as if Eddy turned into Pigpen from The Peanuts for an entire afternoon.

Did I mention that we did all of this work with our front windows open? Oops. The next day we bought some plants to fill in where the grass used to be.

This is Eddy using a drill to dig holes for these plants. That's how hard packed the dry soil was (and also how nutty Eddy was that day.) Finally, we completed the fastest ever mulch job and made it inside just moments before a downpour that lasted three days.

True story.

Next weekend we got out there and added some pretty boulders and the last of the tiny succulents we bought the previous weekend.

Handsome, strong Eddy put them in place

and planted the rest of our tiny succulents.

Here's the finished hellstrip!

Hellishness officially reduced.