The wife and I retired and moved to Southern Oklahoma a couple of years back. We bought a small fixer-upper on the edge of town. The landscaping was a wreck. Parts of it are still a bit...mature.

Within a couple of weeks of completing our move, we had the front yard measured and plans drawn on a few sheets of graph paper. Then, as the work progressed, we began the planting diagrams. The project is going exactly according to plan, but we're about six months behind our original schedule.

The budget, however, involves lots of shoestrings, and we've done all of the work ourselves ...and by hand.

When complete, this will be a fully edible landscape, with every square foot of the garden in production - except for the paths, of course. We're just about half way there. We have approx $2,100 invested in amendments, edging, plants, compost, with landscape cloth and sand as a base layer under the gravel paths.

We have approx. another $1,500 budgeted for the project over the next year to a year and a half. Remaining work: 1.) Build boxes around the raised beds. 2.) Purchase and install the remaining permanent plants. 3.) Remove the sod and replace with edible ground covers. The latter task may be scheduled for three or four years from now, depending on how I feel about things. The sooner I get tired of mowing the grass, the sooner the edible ground covers go in.

First, the 'before.' pic...