Thanks for the advice to my meager message. I had a longer, more detailed post, but my system crashed. So here goes: Here's a link to the front of the home: http://s36.photobucket.com/albums/e16/wookiemouse/New%20House/?action=view&current=8fb2.jpg The immediate front: http://s36.photobucket.com/albums/e16/wookiemouse/New%20House/?action=view&current=d15c.jpg It's not unattractive, but it has a distinct style that I want to stay true to. It is the only house of this style in the county, according to the builder. Most homes in the neighborhood are the traditional Texas rock style. I am well versed in Texas plants and did the design for my last home - which was a nondescript 20 yr old tract home on 0.19 acres, so an informal native Texas garden was quite easy. I have seen similar homes in other areas, but they're situated on less than a 0.5 acre lot - which would be totally manageable. This front yard expanse alone is approximately 2 acres. What's not seen in the photos is the street with a graduated wire fence on metal posts. It blends in with the landscape fairly well - I need it to keep my dogs in, and it doesn't block my views. I also have a small "island" of roses and 3 oak trees just to the left on the main photo. Surrounding this is a circular rock drive lined with larger rocks (seen in the corner of the photo). The drive by the gates extends all the way to the front of the property, about 300 feet or so. It is pebble paved for about 50' and then the rock extends to the street. The property continues with the weeds/rock about 200' to the right of the house in the first photo. It's a large expanse of basically nothing. The only thing I need to be concerned with out there are the septic sprinklers (which release chlorine-treated grey water). I have no desire to irrigate this area, but I need to incorporate it into the landscape somehow or it will simply detract from whatever I end up designing. The previous owners trucked in about 20 loads of topsoil to get the grass growing that you see in the close up. I would rather work with the remaining land than go to that extreme. I need to somehow direct the eye to the house as a focal point. The weeds are mowed in the photo, but they get 2' tall within a week or so and makes the entire property look run down. If I pull the weeds, all I have is rock and dirt. We've just been dealing with the run-down look for now - it takes 5 hours to mow the property, which we do once a month, such that we're not slaves to the house. My current thoughts - - keep the hedges in the front right of the house. I think they work well, but there is a lower bed beneath the hedges that is currently empty. I was thinking possibly blue plumbago in there...something that would spill out over the rock wall. The area in front of the bay window are azaleas. They're ok. I was looking to possibly add a skyrocket spruce (8-10' variety) on either side of the entry to replace the scraggly bushes. The scraggly plants in front of the curved rock wall are lantana. They've filled out nicely but are the full variety. I might replant with New Gold to hug the wall better and not be so bushy. I want to extend the pebble paving to the dirt parts of the driveway - that will help to define the circular drive area, which has the nice grouping of roses I'd like to clean up and keep. I will likely encircle those with a curved stacked rock and add a solar fountain. I was contemplating lining the central drive with a narrow raised bed as well with Japanese boxwood. I could easily run a drip system through that bed and keep the boxwoods shaped. I also plan on keeping the existing lawn and all trees on the property. I usually plan my landscape by working with photos, but I have yet to come across anything that works. My local library has nada, and I don't want to spend $$ on Amazon without some recommendations - the few books I saw that were promising also looked to be more about working with a small landscape. I feel comfortable substituting xeriscape plants for the English varieties, but what I don't want is 2 acres of formal gardens. I need to somehow tie in the "wild" aspect of the yard yet stay true to the style of the hosue. I will hire a professional if need be, but I feel I have some experience and definitely the plant knowledge for this size of a project. My biggest hurdle right now is finding ideas to steer me in the right direction. If I can get a hold on the large 2 acres of weeds, I think the immediate front of the house will be rather simple. Stacy

We have been out and around the pool area more the past few weeks as the weather has gotten a bit warmer. Of course with the warming weather in Houston the number of mosquitos as well as annoying gnats greatly increase. We were sitting in the hot tub last week and mosquitoes were landing on our head and biting us. Not good. We decided that with the level of investment made in our backyard that we needed to ensure we could use it without being attacked. As a result, I began looking at options to get rid of the problem. I looked at foggers...I would need to regularly do this to keep mosquitoes and gnats away and I knew I wouldn't keep up with it. That led me to look at automatic mosquito misting systems. As I am fairly handy around the house, I decided to look at Do It Yourself options. The main choices were systems with 55 or 125 gallon tanks or the newer tankless systems that mix the chemicals with water for each application. I decided that I did not not want the large tank in the yard and I had a good location for the small tankless box which had a power outlet and a hose bib nearby. So I focused my internet research on the tankless systems. The tankless option adds about $400-$500 to the base system cost. I will start this out by saying I am a consumer only and do not represent any company or in any way benefit from what I am writing below. I have no connection to the industry. I have just found very limited information from other consumers on the internet other than " We bought one and love it" and so I decided to write about my experience and will document what I see in the way of results over time. I will also comment on installation and if there are any lessons learned for others. RESEARCH AND PURCHASE The main options that I considered were the Mist Away Gen 3 and the Mosquito Max Series 2 tankless system as both were readily available on the internet for Do It Yourself installers and also available at stores in the Houston area for purchase and service. I could not find a lot of consumer reviews on either system, but the Mist Away Gen 3 did seem to be the more prevalent unit with more dealers/installers nationally. Base features seemed to be similar, although the Mist Away looked to offer a few more options, such as a wind sensor, etc. When I compared prices on the internet, the best I could find on the base Mist Away Gen 3 was $1,645 and the 30 nozzle complete DIY install kit put the final price typically in the $2,400 range. The Mosquito Max system base price was $1,395 and their 25 nozzle complete DIY install kit was $1,725. Adding another 5 nozzles to get to 30 would bring the price up to $1,775 at $10 per nozzle assembly. I looked out on You Tube and found several videos from mosquito system installers with tips and tricks for installation. After watching a few of these I became confident that I could indeed install my own system and would be aware of the typical installation methods and pitfalls. Generally, installation is fairly simple and there are sites that have go-bys to help you design your system. I used a plot plan of my house with measurements to determine the best path for the nylon tubing and the spacing (every 8-12 feet) so that I could add up all the parts needed in advance to see if I should buy a system "kit" or buy parts individually. For me buying a 25 nozzle kit and adding a few nozzles worked out best. I ended up purchasing the Mosquito Max system and picked the unit up from their main office in Katy, Texas with is where the units are made. The unit has a one year warranty and all parts are available from this location should I need them after the warranty period expires. Another plus with a tankless system is that I can easily load it into the trunk of my car and take it to the shop if I need it repaired as opposed to paying for a service call should it be an item I don't feel comfortable trying to fix on my own. SYSTEM DESIGN AND INSTALLATION General installation advice was to create a "perimeter" around the back yard and then add some additional lines as needed that "T" off the main line using a 3 way connector called a "union tee" to cover interior flower beds with shrubs and trees. Tubing can be attached to fence lines with clips or many installers used a combination of clips and a staple gun. In my case the pool and paved areas take up most of the center of the yard (see plot plan at top of blog), which makes for a simple installation. I installed the base unit on the wall just beyond where the pool equipment is located on the plot plan. I bought some 1/2" outdoor rated PVC from our local home improvement store as well as some 90deg. elbows and ran the tubing through the PVC down the wall from the main unit used a 90deg fitting and ran another piece under ground across the small 6' wide small yard and then another 90deg fitting and a PVC piece to go up the fence to just underneath the top cap of the fence which was the starting point for my perimeter backyard installation. I followed a similar process with the water supply tubing that runs from the base unit to the hose bib to protect it from the lawn crew / week whackers. The installation of the tubing and nozzles was so simple that my kids could have done it...and I enlisted the help of my 14 year old to make things go faster. Of course you could do a more elaborate installation than I chose to do, and I am sure many professional installers would have ran the lines inside our fence where it is double sided. However, I chose to attach the tubing just under the top cap on the fence using a combination of staples and plastic clamps that screw in and were supplied in the install kit by the manufacturer. If you keep the lines very straight and choose a tubing color to match your fence the install becomes nearly invisible. As you move along the perimeter you install "T" fittings by pushing one end of the tubing inside the fitting until it locks, then you push in a nozzle until it locks in place via quick connect type mechanism, then you push the next section of 8-10' of tubing in the other side and then keep going and do it again. I used a "C" clamp on each side of the "T" connection to tightly secure it to the fence and this allows me to aim the nozzle in the direction up/down that I wanted it. These "C" clamps are just small plastic fittings that go around the tubing or fitting and have a hole that allows you to screw them into the fence or wall to hold the line/fitting secure. You can use 90deg. fittings in corners so that you do not kink the nylon tubing. Generally I found these to be unnecessary and used "C" clamps to hold the line in corners to ensure it stayed in a smooth curve and did not kink. When you need to branch off the main perimeter line, you just install another "T" fitting, but rather than installing a nozzle in one of the openings, you just insert the nylon tubing for the branch line and then continue down that line adding "T"connections and nozzles as needed. At the end of that line you would install an Elbow fitting and nozzle instead of a "T". Very simple. Each system will have a maximum number of nozzles it can support (80 in my case) and recommendations on how many "branches" they support. Both systems I researched offered a zoning system for purchase that could expand the capacity by sending pressure to one zone at a time similar to an automatic sprinkler system. So I could install a zone for my front yard at a later date and control misting times and durations separately from the back yard. Or I could just choose to install a small valve to turn on/off the front yard if I had enough remaining nozzle capacity on my system (I can still add 50 more nozzles to my machine). All the manufacturers also offer riser assemblies for use in flower beds as well as ways to attach nozzles to trees. These riser assemblies also offer easy push-in connections and copper risers for durability. These are a bit pricey, but would make the install faster and neater. SYSTEM STARTUP Once I had all the tubing installed and the water line connected, I read through the instructions to ensure I had everything correctly connected. I then filled the chemical tank with water to test the unit. After plugging in and setting the spray time to the maximum setting, I did a test spray. We noticed that some of the nozzles were not spraying and adjusted the pressure up to 100lbs per the directions given by the folks when I purchased the unit. This increased the mist near the unit and we immediately noticed that one of the push in connections at one of the "T" locations was leaking. I pushed that tube in firmly and all nozzles began to spray a fine mist as intended. I had no other leaks or issues. I then spent some time aiming nozzles to ensure I had good coverage of each area. After that I poured the selected chemical (Riptide) into the Chemical tank inside the main control box and secured the lid, finished the programming and then tested again. Everything worked perfectly! I did see a few areas that did not have as much mist coverage as I would have preferred. But since adding nozzles is as easy as cutting the line and inserting a new "T" fitting / nozzle, I plan to add several more over time to improve the coverage. Overall, it took me about 5-6 hours to install my simple system around the perimeter of the back yard with some of that time spent reading instructions, digging a small trench (4-5' deep across 6' wide side yard) and hanging the unit on the brick wall. I would estimate I saved between $1,000 and $1,500 on installation fees as most systems installed that I read about were in the $3,000-$3,500 range. SETTINGS I used the system's "SUMMER" setting initially which sprays 4 times a day for 45 seconds. Twice in the early AM and twice in the evening. Once I have the mosquitoes under control I will likely change to once in the AM and once at dusk. CHEMICAL SELECTION As I noted above I chose Riptide initially, but I read that many people rotate between Riptide and Sector. Riptide generally had higher ratings and I liked that it was water based and does not leave an oily residue and was safety for plants (some will burn plants so read labels closely). It also works on many other pest insects such as ants, gnats, fleas, moths, etc... RESULTS I will come back to the site after some time to report on results as most manufacturers say it takes 2-3 weeks to eradicate the mosquito population in your yard. What I did notice immediatly was that the number of small flying insects under our covered patio lights was down significantly by the second night the system had been in operation. I will also post some pictures of the unit and infall.

Hi PKpnder & Annieaustin! I will get this over on the Texas board as soon as spring break is over. Lots of stuff going on with the kids this next week. Yardvaark, thanks for your help. I'll try to get better pics posted as soon as I can. I was totally being lazy using google maps and see that they don't add much. I want to start with the walkway as it provides a clean edge to move from. The grass along the walk and walls has dried up, so it seemed logical to remove the dead stuff first. I have already begun removing the grass from that area (prior to seeking opinions here). Since I am wanting to do the work myself (including whatever child labor I can get the kids to add) I started where I knew help was needed with the intent to grow from there. I realize that having a final design is important to minimize the patchwork look that I want to avoid (which is why I've come here). I cannot really define what's wrong any better than what I've said. The stone on the house, walkways, and walls don't lend much color. I am not a fan of watering or caring for grass (especially in an area with a near constant need to conserve water). I want to add color, texture, and depth to a bland boring yard by using native/drought tolorant plants. -Joanna

Around the wall, find a simple scheme that allows you to bring in flowering shrubs, maybe a perennial, and some groundcover. Uncarefully laid masonry objects (or rocks) placed above grade in order to create a bed edge, has a tendency to look like construction materials left over. It would be better to inset a mowing strip flush with grade and make it at least 8" wide (instead of 3 1/2"). In general terms, the house leans toward being smothered and cluttered, so I'd work to have fewer objects overall, meaning consolidate plants where possible. Instead of having segmented hedges of separate shrubs, let them grow together into solid hedges that coordinate well with architectural features. None of the vertical plants interspersed between the hedges are "singing" to me and I would do away with them. Find places for color ... not quarts but 5-gallon buckets worth or more. IMO, the tree canopy is too low and looks oppressive. I'd get rid of the low, horizontal limbs. Where grass has no hope of growing well, it would be better to transition to groundcover. Not least, the walk -- especially for such a wide house -- needs to be widened. And the planters flanking it need to go.