Summer is the perfect time to focus on an amazing back yard for you, your family and even your pets to enjoy. Landscaping over the summer can spruce up your home, provide hours and hours of enjoyment and create a resource for everyone who knows you to enjoy, year after year. We have looked over the latest trends and come up with the most important tips that don't have to cost you a ton of money or take up all your time to implement. Take some time to read over what we've come up with! 

Use Native Plants

Living in McKinney, Texas (near Dallas) we are pretty used to hot weather and droughts during the summer, conserving water is a big concern for us. One of the best things you can do in this particular scenario is to use native plants. Native plants require much less water than other species that are either exotic or non-native, which could save a homeowner, especially with a large yard, hundreds if not thousands of dollars per year.

Use Lighting

One of the biggest mistakes people make in landscaping is not adding adequate lighting to highlight all the best parts of the yard. Make sure to use lighting to highlight things like your walkways, flowerbeds, porch, and gardens. Use spotlights to highlight your favorite plants, bushes or even lanterns and string lighting hanging above.

Make Sure to Mix Colors

Different types of foliage can be used as an alternative to flowers to add tons of great colors to your entire landscape. You can mix and match all types of boxwoods, elephant's ears and begonias for a complex and beautiful landscape from spring to late fall depending where you are in the country. 

Add Plants With Fragrance

Of course flowers are pretty and lots of them smell fantastic but you can add an entirely new dimension by adding in the right places. A backyard full of flowers is one of the greatest parts of spring for homeowners and they can last through the summer. You can add roses to a walkway, Petunias to your porch (they smell amazing at night), Phlox's bloom all summer long and all are resistant to droughts during the summer.

Create Structure Throughout Your Yard

A great way to make a more complex yard is to add some plant structure. For example, boxwood hedges stand strong year-round and make a great foundation for other colorful plants. If you don't like the straight-lined hedge look, you might look at small trees or even shrubs with unique shapes. White pine and amur cherry have really interesting barks.

Create a Water Vibe

Fountains and ponds can make for a really cool center point of a back yard. Even a small water feature can make a huge visual impact. As technology advances, water features are much cheaper, app-controlled and can even mix with led lights to make a really awesome water-light show at night.

Count on Wildlife

What can make your yard even cooler? Why the birds and the bees of course. Bees, birds, butterflies, and squirrels can add a whole new level of yard coolness. Bees love hyssop and yarrow plants, butterflies like wild basil and violets, and squirrels like a good old squirrel feeder. Birdbaths and hummingbird homes will invite a zoo into your yard.

Add Your Own Personal Touch

Great gardens and parks in your community usually feature outdoor living areas where family can sit for a picnic and talk while children play. You can add areas like this in your yard but on a much smaller scale. A small gazebo tucked in the corner of your yard or as a center piece, picnic tables or even lawn furniture can give your family a place to gaze at stars all night long.

• Add a colorful fence
• Plant new or mixed grasses
• A doggy sandbox
• Edible plants like strawberries or an apple tree
• Raised beds
• Build a fire pit surrounded by chairs
• Add posts and string lights over the top of your sitting area
• Add a stone patio with mazeras stones
• Add a koi pond with a fountain
• Add a playhouse for the kids
• Add a small waterfall
• Add a pergola 
• Add hanging plants

If you're ready to try some new things with your back yard, go for it! There are so many beautiful and fantastic things you can be doing that are relatively inexpensive. You have to start somewhere!