When we were looking to buy our house we didn't pay too much attention to the backyard other than to notice it was a nice size.  Lucy was the only one who went outside regularly and she obviously had no complaints.  :)

Last spring when Maddie was old enough to enjoy being outdoors we looked at our yard a little more closely and realized just how bad it was.  There were two small dead trees, some out of control bush-like things, and a million weeds.  Wanting Maddie to have a yard to play in, we sprayed the weeds, pulled some of them up, raked the yard, and put out grass seed.  We also dug up one of the trees and planted a new one.  A few months later we once again had a yard full of weeds and our new tree wasn't looking so great.  The super hot summer with very little rain didn't do much to help us out.

This year we decided to try again, with a little more effort on our part.  Eric cut down one of the dead trees and dug up the other.  He also cut down the bush-like things.  We sprayed the weeds, pulled some of the large ones, and then Eric tilled the entire yard a couple of times.  Some stinky compost was added, the yard was tilled some more and then we put out grass seed.  A new tree was planted along with some rose bushes.  We've been super diligent about watering and in a little less than three months our yard has gone from this:

to this:

Maddie has spent so much of her time on the patio that it's taking her a little while to warm up to the idea of actually walking on the grass, but she's beginning to venture out there more and more.  Yay for a nice lawn for Maddie and Baby Boy to play in!