If you have a back yard of any size, chances are you'll want to design it as carefully as you would the rooms in your house. You want to make it a place where you'll enjoy spending your time, and feeling like you are indeed at home. Smaller yards often need to be designed better than larger ones - there is less room for error.

Make a Plan

Do not start making haphazard attempts to improve your landscape - make a plan on paper and experiment with different ideas before you make your final decisions and implement them. And don't just draw your plan "roughly." Use graph paper, and draw everything in your backyard to scale, so that you'll know that everything that you want will fit. Although using graph paper is the easiest way of making your plans, you can also use software to do the job. claims to be America's #1 home and landscape design software. is strictly for landscape and garden design, and includes a plant encyclopedia.

Coordination is Key

Another reason not to do things in a haphazard fashion is because its too easy to get mismatched items out of the deal. And gardens and yards look so much nicer when everything in them matches, from the same designs for pots of various sizes, to the same type of bricks to line your paths or flower beds..

Landscapes are for Living

If you have a lot of kids - or if there's the possibility that a lot of kids will be running around your yard, it's best to design the yard with them in mind. Don't use a lot of fragile items because it's all too likely that they'll get destroyed. Be careful what type of play constructions you use - from swing sets to sand boxes.

And give a thought to your weekly task - mowing. If you have too many large boulders or statues to mow around, it can annoy you every week as you do that task.

Catch Their Eye

Expert designers suggest that you always have a "focal point," an object that will draw the eye of an admirer, and which will then be complemented by all the other features in your landscape. The focal point could be a conservatory building, or a water or rock garden, or something similar.

Gardens

There are all kinds of gardens - a vegetable garden so you can grow your own food, a flower garden to add a riot of color to your yard, a rock garden which will allow you to contemplate life, or a water garden which can fulfill the same purpose.

Idea Alley

Visit your local home improvement store and browse through their books on the subject of landscaping. They'll give you plenty of ideas. But don't stop there. You can find an infinite number of ideas by surfing the web. So, take some time, take some care, and create for yourself the perfect back yard.