My Summer Project

Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

As many of you may already know, I am the President of the SMSU SIFE team, and we own and operate our own store. The store is called Nature's Backyard, and we sell wild bird supplies, lawn decor, and a variety of gift items.

A little background info - Nature's Backyard is located on the corner of two streets, Main and Third. Well Main street has been closed, due to construction, since last May. Main street is the main enterance to our store, so this made the summer tough for us, especially with it being our typical busy season.

So with the slow down at the store, I decided that I would take this opportunity to undertake a large project, sprucing up the "Yard." I pooled all of our resources and dramatically increased our inventory! In addition, another volunteer and myself decided that we wanted to revamp the interior. We landscaped the inside of our store with pavers and mulch. Then in a spur-the-moment decision, we also put in a pond. With the help of our other volunteers, we were able to complete the landscaping. We also gathered antique items to use in our new display areas. The entire project could not have turned out any better! The store looks wonderful!

With the grand opening of Main street happening next week, we still have some work to do. We have two huge walk-in displays surrounding our main enterance that could use some rework, and we need to make a new store sign.

Wish me luck!

Pictures - The picture at the top of this post is the new view of our store when you come in the main enterance. To the left is a picture of a section of our extened Droll Yankees line. To the right is a picture of the landscaping and merchandise surrounding our porch. And below is a picture of two of my favorite products at Nature's Backyard! Please forgive me, there was a smudge on my camera lens, and it shows up in the majority of these pictures.