I’ve always wanted to create a beautiful xeriscape garden, not the kind that is all hardscape, but the type that is a haven for butterflies, and bees. This year we did it.
My front yard consisted of a front lawn (approximately 600 square feet), and the lawn was not doing well. I hated how much water it needed. I hated how much fertilizer and pesticides you needed to treat it with just to maintain the standards that the HOA demanded. After speaking with a neighbor, I discovered the Garden in a Box program and was inspired.
Here are the steps I took:
The Garden in a Box program is very popular, with gardens selling out very quickly. I signed up for their email list. I needed to get HOA approval. I did this in late 2024. The space is west-facing and about 85% of of it gets some intense afternoon sun. We have an apple tree that provides some shade, which means I needed to get plants that could be a little bit more adaptable. When Garden in a Box (through Resource Central) emailed that this year’s gardens were available for purchase and order, I jumped at the chance. Given the space I needed to cover, I ended up ordering 2 gardens, both pollinator friendly.
I started lawn removal in Mid April. (The plants were available Mid-May.)
I could’ve hired someone, but I was on a budget, so I decided to do it by hand. It was quite the job. First, I had to dig up the lawn.
Then we had to remove the nasty, heavy, clay soil.
Don’t forget to locate gas and water lines!
I capped off the existing sprinkler heads.
This took much longer than I anticipated. I’m glad I started as early as the weather allowed. We needed to get the space ready for the plants. I was so excited to finally receive them! We stored them in the garage, and gave them a nice big drink of water before planting them the next morning.
For planting, Garden in Box does provide a suggested plan that you can follow, or create your own design. Because of some of my sun/ shade issues, I needed to create my own plan, which I did. (I did end up getting a few more plants from Lowe’s to fill in some of the spaces.)
We added some fresh soil to each plant as we planted.
Next, I laid down soaker hoses. And then it was time to go shopping for mulch. We covered the garden with nice deep mulch (slightly deeper than the 3 inch depth they recommended, because we ended up ordering too much mulch.) I added a small bird bath and a water dish for insects.
For a nice “finish” we put in metal edging.
Of course, my bunnies thought that all those beautiful plants and extra deep mulch was put there just for them. So to help the plants not to be overwhelmed by bunny predation, I put down chickenwire barriers. (Most of the plants are bunny resistant, but in their first year, I wanted to give them as much of a good start as I could.)
These types of gardens take about 3 growing seasons to get established. I’m so looking forward to seeing how this garden grows.
