"update" is a little vague in terms of what you want to accomplish. would you like more extensive plantings? a larger paved patio area? a fire pit? planting benches? there are a lot of ways to go with this much space, but you need some ideas of your own priorities before you're going to get anything useful from us or from any professionals.

Make a destination to go to - walk to be alone, or with another - for a view beyond your property, or within it. Bench, etc.... water feature, fragrant planting.

even an ideabook of things you like would help.

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Thank you for the comments and we apologize for being too vague. Just looking for ideas from people who are more creative than we are as to how to make the yard more interesting as we really don't know. We are open to any and all ideas. I guess if we're too vague we will continue to look at gardening and landscaping magazines and see if something appeals to us or catches our attention. Thank you everdebz about the idea of a 'destination'. Perhaps a small fire pit with some seating might be an idea or a little water feature.

I've not built myself! -- create a room[s] just like the inside.... outdoor kitchen? but expensive; family room...think what you do outside; are there items you dream of like an arbor or little bridge....

Interesting..... I’m not sure what I expected a backyard in the Yukon might look like :-) but this looks a bit more suburban than I expected.... We have friends who live in northern Ontario and black bears (raiding their veggie garden) are a major pest. Do you have wildlife issues like that to deal with? (i.e. do you need to consider that with respect to height and sturdiness of the fence?) Do you have kids and/or pets whose needs should be factored in? How long is your growing season? Do you have - or want - a flower garden that includes perennials as well as annuals? How big is the property? What is in the raised bed? Is that your planting or something that came with the property when you bought it?

I like the Mediterranean Garden photo above provided by acm, especially if you MUST keep the two sheds where they are. You don't want to draw more attention to the sheds by putting colorful plantings right between them. If you're going to use the existing deck, toss the tent and put up a trellis type structure for shade or insects. This could be on the deck or just off the deck. This would be a great sit-down area for meals. To obscure the sheds in the back, make the area from off your deck up to nearly the middle of backyard your entertainment/focal point. Plant a line (or half-circle) of holly bushes or some other planting to keep your eye away from the back fence area. This could be the background of your fire pit area that would come off the back deck. A brick patio area would also keep visitors "planted" in that area while entertaining. Add benches to the deck and seating around the fire pit. Just a few thoughts. I think your yard has great potential. And one more thing, it would be perfectly fine to paint both your sheds a nice shade of green or brown color (or whatever you like) to make them "disappear" even more. Just make sure to paint them the same color! Have fun!

The raised bed came with the property. Unfortunately, nothing seems to grow there very well due the tree roots encroaching the area. We have considered removing those trees so that more things will grow (more sunlight allowed and get rid of the tree roots but really do hate to take down trees). In the past we have tried annual flowers and rhubarb without much success. We do have a small dog that needs to be fenced in. No small children. Our growing season is early June until mid to third week of August before the first of the winter frosts arrive. We haven't had a problem with wildlife getting in the back yard though there are some arctic foxes seen occasionally in the neighborhood as well as squirrels. There is the occasional bear but never in the backyard. In the front of the house we do have a perennial lilac and arctic rose bush and they are doing very well. Arctic poppies do well up here as well. A lot of people seem to have rock gardens up here. We have thought of putting in a brick pathway to the little storage shed and perhaps planting some shrubbery along the path to break up the yard as well putting in some shrubs along the fence line.

Some great ideas. Yes, we have lots of mosquitoes but for some reason this summer they weren't particularly bad though most people tend to have something to keep out the mosquitoes when sitting outside for sure. Thank you for the advice of not using a whole bunch of different shrubs, plants etc.

Are you in or near Whitehorse or further north? i.e. what zone are you in? Do you intend to stay at this property for the long-term? Is there a local garden group and/or a good local garden centre to consult with?

I would think that any sort of hardscaping (e.g. brick or stone paths or patio would be difficult to do well (is there permafrost in the ground to deal with?) so would not be worth the time, effort or cost! It looks like you can grow some sort of grass, so I’d stick to that as the ground layer and focus on shaping the space to be functional in the brief warmer months and as attractive as possible in the winter. That would lead me, I think, to keep the center of the space clear and put the plantings at the fence. The raised bed(s) look like they have a weed problem too...? If they can’t be cleaned up and/or the root competition is too much of an issue, I’d be inclined to try to remove the edging and just have a smooth grassy slope if the mound can’t be removed without damaging the tree roots.

What is the shed on the left that blends in (except for the white door!) with the background made of? It almost looks like it’s some sort of greenhouse or growing shelter...? I’d be inclined to repaint the white door and trim to whatever color the rest of it is to further help it disappear. The other shed I’d be inclined to paint to match the green of the evergreen trees - is it perhaps white now to match the winter snow?! (Do you have a picture of the yard in winter? That would be interesting to see...). If you prefer the shed white, maybe just paint the blue trim green so the winter backyard is all green and white...?

If you’ve got flowers in the front, the two perennials I associate with flowering in northern areas are delphiniums - and peonies. Have you tried them? Also, potentilla shrubs are native to circumpolar areas - are they grown in your area?

Have you seen how nice red-twigged dogwood looks in the snow?

https://whatsupyukon.com/Yukon%20Outside/yukon-winter/yukon-trees-in-winter/

Thanks for posting the winter pictures! That helps.... Given that winter is the longest period, it does make sense that the shed is 'snow colored' :-) So, in the growing season, to blend the shed in better I'd try to add some blues and whites to other parts of the yard. Consider trying to eliminate the upper level of the raised bed, clean out weeds, and plant the rest with something like pansies/violas - I think they do well in the north and, if you chose ones in a range of blues/dark purple, and white that would pick up the shed colors and connect the shed to the sitting/lawn/garden area - add some of the same pansies to pots by the sitting area and the greenhouse to further link the shed into the yard. I'd paint the door on the greenhouse to match the color of the covering as best you can to fade the greenhouse into the background. But, to further draw your eyes away from the greenhouse and further connect the shed to the rest of the yard, try planting delphiniums in the area by the greenhouse. Remove the white rocks that make a raised edge around the tree near there and try to just smooth out that raised bed to make it part of the lawn.

I'm not very good at modifying photos but here is my crude attempts at showing the changes proposed:

Summer:

Winter - greenhouse area:

I did some Google image searches to see if I could find pictures of the suggested plants in the Yukon - delphiniums Peonies Pansies

If you found a local source of seeds, the delphiniums and pansies could be easily grown from seed - use that greenhouse of yours :-) The delphinium seeds need cold stratification to germinate so you should have no problem giving them that! :-) Back in the days when I grew them from seed, I just left the seed package sitting on the back porch for a week or two. Most of the peony pictures in the link are indoors - bouquets and flower shows - but some are outdoor plant pictures so ask around locally to see how well they do in your front garden. I'm sure the pansies would be available locally anywhere plants are sold, but you could probably grow them from seed too.

It's been interesting thinking about gardening in such a different environment :-) Have fun!

Great ideas! Thank you!

No doubt you've seen red dogwood bushes - if you want to expand a tree area, they can do that. Or a group with fluffy grasses to contrast with their 'sticks'. Shorter grasses in front of red?