Rented property and low cost garden maintenance advice needed!

[coveredinsnot]

We rent. It sucks. We have a small front garden which is very low maintenance (some bushes and gravel and the occasional bag of dog shit passers by seem to like to lob in there every now nd then - delightful. We do remove those!). Quite a few weeds too. The rear garden is a mess. Lawn (bit patchy) two neglected vegetable beds, and borders with very hard soil. A wild, neglected area at the back which is fairly hidden from view so we ignore it. Not very big -lawn is about 5 x 7 metres.

We both work a full time. We have one child and another way. We don't have much money and I'm not keen to throw much money at the garden as it's not ours as such! And our landlord is a complete tight arse so I don't want to leave him better off when we move out! (bitter? Me? Never!)

Aside from occasionally hacking at things, are there any low cost things we can do to make it look good rather than just looking like the outside? Ideally I'd love to be able to stop all the sodding weeds from popping up all over the place!

For cheap plants I second the cheap shelf in homebase. I picked up some sad looking plants for 40p today! (Felt sorry for them, couldn't resist rescuing!). They generally range from about 40p-£1 and seem fine, just a little tired and without flowers.

Also buy some cheap flower seed packets (meadow wildflower ones usually cheap) and just scatter in some cleared soil. Unlikely to come up this year but should look pretty in spring.

Yes I did the wildflower thing before and nowt happened! Very disappointed. Was very cheap grass and wildflower seed mix though
We have a rough patch at the end of the garden where the lawn just kind of runs out
That's where I tried the wildflowers before
Ah well!

Worth popping into Wilkinson asap as they're marking certain things down quite a bit. They had a basket full of 10p seeds in ours. I got loads for next year as they're dated 2016-2018 so should be fine. Worth asking a member of staff as some of the reduction areas are quite well hidden, ours was by the customer service desk [confused

I got quite a few packs from the Wilko kids range as they made me smile - spaceship squashes, poached egg flowers, Mexican hat flowers etc

They also had large pouches of mixed wildflower seeds and 'patio planter' mixes - I think the brand was Gro-sure/ Miracle-Gro for £1/£2. Dated until next year. They were on a shelf by the end of an aisle.

The latter pouch mixes were really quite big (££ rrp) and I'd expect them to do well. Think they might've contained feed too. I know what you mean about the cheap wildflower mix, it's failed on me too

Ooh I will! Thanks for the tip!

How's it going, coveredinsnot (love the name!)

Do have any photos?

Haha I've done NOTHING!!!! Been feeling very pregnant and achy the last couple of days and not moved far! Have had some great naps though will definitely update when something has happened. Actually I watched a very helpful YouTube video about bulb lasagnas so have mentally prepared myself!

Napping sounds ace I'm watching a pair of sunloungers on eBay for that very purpose

I'm desperate for a decent sun lounger! Would really like a steamer lounger thing to avoid collapsing on something while pregnant... Going to look on eBay now!

Paint your own birdhouse for 2.22 delivered here (courtesy of Hot UK Deals)
cpc.farnell.com/unbranded/bb-bh290/paint-your-own-wooden-bird-house/dp/CP0612464

No idea of quality but could keep a child entertained for a little while and add some decoration to the garden Might be better to use your own paints rather than those supplied. Wilko do little packs of craft stuff to glue on too

Lovely idea! Any suggestions on where to put a birdhouse safely? We have two cats..