Meet Glenn: How My Backyard Disasters Turned Into Unexpected Wins

"The book makes room for imperfection. The instructions are clear enough to guide you, but flexible enough to let your 'oops' moments become part of the process."

Glenn's backyard looked like a graveyard of good intentions. Half-finished projects dotted the landscape like abandoned archaeological sites. A chicken coop with a door that wouldn't close properly. Garden beds with corners that didn't quite meet at right angles. A compost bin that looked more like a pile of pallets someone forgot to finish assembling.

He wasn't incompetent. He just had a habit of starting projects with enthusiasm and ending them with creative compromise.

At Lay It Flat, we believe the right book at the right time can transform not just skills, but entire mindsets. Glenn's story with "50 Projects for Building Your Backyard Homestead" exemplifies this perfectly. His review caught our attention because it captured something essential: permission to be imperfect while still making progress.

The Man Who Kept Building Wrong

Glenn is a software developer in his late thirties who'd been trying to homestead his half-acre lot for two years before he ever opened a book about it.

Two full years.

"I thought I could figure it out," Glenn said. "I'm a problem solver. I fix bugs for a living. How hard could building a chicken coop be?"

Turns out, very hard when you approach physical construction as if it were a coding problem you can debug on the fly.

His learning method was pure trial and error, heavy on the error. YouTube videos watched at 1.5x speed while eating lunch. Blog posts skimmed for the basic idea. Reddit threads about someone else's project that seemed similar enough to his needs.

Then he'd just start building.

The chicken coop took three weekends and looked like it had survived a natural disaster. The door required a specific lifting and angling technique, which his wife called "the secret handshake." When their neighbor asked if the tilt was intentional, Glenn had defended it as "rustic character."

He knew it was crooked. He just didn't know how to make it not crooked.

"Every project I started, I thought this would be the one where I figured it out," Glenn explained. "But I kept making the same kinds of mistakes because I didn't understand fundamentals. I was copying steps without knowing why they mattered."

The Gift That Sat on the Shelf

Glenn didn't find "50 Projects for Building Your Backyard Homestead" through desperate late-night searching. His brother-in-law gave it to him for Christmas.

It sat on his shelf for four months.

"I was kind of offended at first," Glenn admitted. "Like, was this his way of saying my projects looked terrible? Because they did, but I didn't need a book to tell me that."

The book remained unopened through winter while Glenn planned his spring projects. He was going to build raised beds for vegetables, a proper compost system, and maybe a small greenhouse. He had Pinterest boards. He had ambition. He had two years of experience, which surely counted for something.

What finally made Glenn open the book wasn't frustration or failure. It was boredom.

A rainy Saturday in March. His wife took their daughter to a birthday party. Glenn was alone in the house with nothing to do and a growing pile of lumber in the garage for projects he'd been planning.

He picked up the book mostly to pass the time.

Reading Like It Was Revolutionary

Glenn started reading with the attitude of someone humoring a well-meaning relative. He'd flip through, see what this book thought was so important, probably find it was too basic or too advanced or too something.

The first chapter stopped him cold.

It was about understanding wood. Not how to cut it or nail it, but how wood actually works. Grain direction. Why boards warp. How moisture affects everything. The difference between construction-grade and finish-grade lumber and when each matters.

Glenn realized he'd been building with lumber for two years and didn't know any of this.

"I'd been treating all wood like it was the same," he said. "Just grab whatever's cheapest at the hardware store and start cutting. I had no idea why some boards twisted after I installed them or why my corners never stayed square."

He kept reading. The book didn't jump into project instructions. It built foundation after foundation of understanding. Joinery principles. Why square corners matter for structural integrity, not just appearance. How to think about weight distribution and stress points.

Three hours later, Glenn was still reading. His wife came home to find him surrounded by notebook pages covered in sketches and notes.

"Are you actually studying a homesteading book?" she asked, surprised.

"I think I've been doing everything wrong," Glenn said.

The Rebuild Nobody Asked For

Most people would have started with a new project. Test out the new knowledge on something fresh, leave the old mistakes in the past.

Glenn decided to rebuild his chicken coop.

"My chickens deserved better than a structure that looked like it was drunk," he explained. "And I needed to prove to myself that I actually understood what the book was teaching."

He didn't follow a specific project from the book. Instead, he used the principles from the first several chapters to design his own coop. Understanding grain direction for the framing. Applying proper joinery techniques for corners. Thinking through door placement and function before cutting a single board.

The rebuild took two full weekends, the same amount of time as his original crooked coop. But the result was completely different.

Straight walls. Square corners. A door that closed without negotiation. His wife walked into the backyard, stopped, and just stared.

"Did you hire someone?" she asked.

"I learned how to think about building," Glenn said. "Instead of just trying to copy instructions I didn't really understand."

The Notebook of Beautiful Failures

Glenn started keeping a notebook of his mistakes around this time, but not for the reason you'd expect.

"I wasn't trying to avoid repeating errors," he said. "I was documenting how mistakes could become something interesting when you understood enough to adapt."

A crooked fence post he'd installed a year ago? Glenn had wanted to pull it out and redo it. But after understanding load distribution and stress points from the book, he realized it was actually stable. The angle wasn't structural; it was aesthetic. So he left it.

"A crooked fence post becomes character," Glenn wrote in his notebook. "As long as it's doing its job safely, imperfection can be part of the design."

The lopsided pond was another example. Glenn had started digging in what he thought was level ground, only to discover a significant slope halfway through. His old approach would have been to muscle through and hope it worked out.

Instead, he paused. Thought about water flow and natural drainage patterns from a chapter on site planning. Redesigned the pond as a cascade that worked with the slope instead of fighting it.

His daughter declared it looked like a real creek. Glenn counted that as a win.

The notebook became a chronicle of learning to work with imperfection rather than being defeated by it. Each entry showed not just what went wrong, but how understanding principles let him turn problems into features.

Teaching What He Was Still Learning

Six months after opening the book, Glenn's neighbor asked him for help building a compost bin.

"I saw your new coop," Mr. Chen said. "And I noticed you've been doing more projects. I thought maybe you could show me how you plan these things?"

Glenn almost laughed. Six months ago, he'd been the neighborhood disaster. Now people were asking for his advice?

But he agreed. They spent a Saturday afternoon in Mr. Chen's yard, Glenn explaining not just what to build but why certain approaches worked better than others.

"This is what I wish someone had taught me from the start," Glenn said, sketching basic principles on paper. "It's not about following instructions perfectly. It's about understanding what you're trying to achieve and why different techniques matter."

Mr. Chen's compost bin turned out great, but with some creative adaptations when they discovered his yard had different drainage than the book's example assumed.

"That's the thing," Glenn told him. "Once you understand principles, you can adapt. You're not stuck trying to force your situation to match someone else's instructions."

A coworker mentioned wanting to build raised beds but felt intimidated by conflicting advice online. Glenn loaned him the book with one instruction: "Read the fundamentals chapters before you look at any projects. Everything else will make more sense."

What Actually Changed

Glenn's backyard still isn't perfect. Some projects have visible quirks. His greenhouse has one corner where he had to adjust the measurements to avoid a tree root he hadn't anticipated.

But everything works now. And more importantly, Glenn understands why it works.

"I spent two years building things without understanding what I was doing," Glenn reflected. "I thought experience would teach me. But experience without understanding just taught me how to repeat the same mistakes creatively."

His seven-year-old daughter now helps with projects. Not pretending to help, but really helping. She knows why we check if something's level and what happens if we don't. She understands that wood expands with moisture. She caught Glenn mixing up two boards last month because she noticed the grain was running the wrong direction.

"She's learning to think about building, not just follow steps," Glenn said. "That's what I wish I'd learned from the beginning."

The spiral-bound format that Glenn initially didn't think mattered turned out to be crucial for his working style. The book stays open on his workbench, often weighted down against the wind, covered in sawdust, and marked with notes in the margins.

"I reference it constantly while I'm working," Glenn explained. "Not for step-by-step instructions anymore, but to double-check principles when I'm adapting a project to my specific situation. A book that won't stay flat is useless when your hands are full, and you need quick confirmation that you're thinking about something correctly."

Advice From Someone Who Learned Slowly

Glenn's advice for others doesn't follow the usual pattern of "start with easy projects and work your way up."

"Start by understanding why before you try to understand how," he says. "I wasted two years doing things wrong because I was copying instructions without comprehension. Learn the fundamentals first, even if it's boring. Especially if it's boring."

He also emphasizes that experience without understanding just builds bad habits.

"Don't assume that doing more projects will automatically make you better. I built a dozen things before I opened this book, and they were all disasters because I didn't understand what I was doing. One project with understanding is worth more than ten projects of trial and error."

His most practical tip: "Get comfortable with adapting. Real yards have tree roots, slopes, and complications that don't exist in project plans. Once you understand principles, you can adjust. But if you're just following steps, any deviation feels like failure."

Looking Forward

Glenn's current project is a larger greenhouse using techniques from multiple projects in the book. But he's not following any single project directly. He's designing based on his specific yard, climate, and needs, using principles he finally understands.

"A year ago, this would have terrified me," he said. "Now it feels natural because I can break it down into components that make sense. I know what needs precision and what can be flexible. I know which mistakes matter and which don't."

The greenhouse will probably have some quirks. Glenn expects that now. He's already planning how to document them in his notebook, not as failures but as adaptations.

"Perfect isn't the goal anymore," Glenn said. "Functional is the goal. Understanding is the goal. Being able to fix problems when they come up instead of just hoping they don't, that's the goal."

Your Story Starts Here

Glenn's journey reminds us that time spent doesn't equal learning. He spent two years building before he spent two hours reading, and those two hours changed everything.

If you've been approaching homesteading through trial and error, hoping that eventually something will click, Glenn's experience shows the value of stepping back and building understanding before building structures.

The spiral-bound format that made such a difference in Glenn's workshop isn't just about convenience. It's about recognizing that books should work in real environments where people actually use them, with dirty hands, outdoor conditions, and constant need for reference.

Ready to start your own backyard homesteading journey with actual understanding instead of educated guessing? Explore 50 Projects for Building Your Backyard Homestead and discover how learning principles before projects can transform your relationship with building, one slightly crooked fence post at a time.