Gardening can revitalize both your yard and your spirit.

Backyard Miracle Makeovers

For Debra Kaysen of Seattle, WA, gardening has always been something that's about bringing family together.

Willa Swiller in the Eden she designed herself.

"[Gardening] takes energy and commitment," says Swiller. "It's basically like having a pet."

"Growing up, I gardened with my mother, and my mom has fond memories of gardening with her father," says Kaysen, 37.

So, she felt some disappointment when she first glimpsed the backyard of the home she and her husband moved into 7 years ago. It was far from a lush oasis.

"It was really ugly," says Kaysen. "The worst part was an inground concrete pool that was empty and too small to really use."

Kaysen, who was pregnant at the time, was determined to make the place green and gorgeous. She dreamed of having a pretty spot where she could one day garden with her child.

She and her husband solved the problem of the unsightly pool by doing something slightly counterintuitive: They painted it black. "Then we bought fish and made it into a koi pond, with water lilies and water irises," she says. They built a deck around the pond, then brightened up the darker parts of the yard by planting flowers that could grow in the shade, such as bleeding hearts and hostas.

"I was literally on my knees planting flowers while I was 2 weeks past my due date - the neighbors were like 'Please stop! You're going to hurt yourself!' But I had to get it done," she says. "When I got the last plant into the ground, I thought to myself, 'Okay, now I can have the baby.' He was born the next morning. I think he was waiting for the flowers."

For many of us, the backyard is an area that lets us bring a little natural beauty into our daily lives. It's a place that everyone can enjoy - an outdoor family room where people can focus on each other and nature, instead of on the television.

So how can you make your disaster yard into an envied Eden? "Think of it as an open air living room," says Mary Ellen Polson, home design expert and author of Curb Appeal. This means making your yard viewable from inside. Try replacing solid doors with glass doors. No direct doors or windows open onto the yard? Create the illusion of linking the interior and exterior by painting a trompe l'oeil door.

And plants?

"People are afraid of gardening . . . and they should be!" says garden design expert Willa Swiller of White Plains, NY. "It takes energy and commitment. It's basically like having a pet. But it can also be extremely rewarding to have that daily connection with nature."

Swiller, however, believes successful gardening is a real possibility if you keep a few simple things in mind.

Scrap old, woody, overly tall shrubs. "Just dig them out. It's nothing personal!"
Hide a foundation, "with a mixture of both flowering plants, like pieris or flowering rhododendron, and green leafy ones."
Don't shy away from pots. "Even a maple tree can be grown in a pot and then can be stored in a garage in the winter."
Buy in threes. "This creates repetition. Plant in twos, people won't see it's a theme; plant more than three of something and it can look like too much."

Today, Kaysen's son Evan is 6 years old, and he loves flowers as much as his mom does. Using his own kid-sized trowel, he helps his mother weed in their beautiful yard and also plants in a small patch of soil that's just for him. He likes eating strawberries his mom grows and making wishes when blowing on dandelion puffs.

"Then he collects the seeds and plants them in his little garden," says Kaysen.

Talk about a dream come true.

Posted on May 29, 2006