Your weeds are out of control - welcome to the club. This happens to ALL of us at one point, sometimes many points.

First, don't move anything you want to keep right now - we are coming to the hottest part of the year, which is not a good time for transplanting.

Second, triage what you've got. If the front is most important, spend what time you've got there. Start weeding! Pull out the weed(s) and either compost them, if you have room for a bin, or put them in the garbage. It looks like you mulched the front, so after you weed, put more mulch down - you need at least a couple of inches to make a difference with the weeds.

For the hosta bed, weed there, and put in an edge of some kind to keep the grass out; it should go down a couple of inches, as grass roots will spread. That applies to all the beds - metal edging, landscape timbers, something like that - where the beds meet grass.

For the former shrub bed, if all that's there is weeds, then just mow it until you have time to deal with it, or think about it. Same goes for the part you plan to expand into next year. If you have the time, pitchfork it over, pull out the worst weeds, and cover it thickly with newspaper, and mulch on top of that - that smothering will work on most annual weeds, and you'll have easier digging when you're ready.

I can't see the particular weeds closely enough to identify; if there is something that is giving you fits, post a closer picture of it here and you will get help.

You have the bones of a nice garden shaping up there. Maintenance is a pain in the neck, but is part of gardening, I'm afraid. Good luck, and let us know how it goes.

My former neighbours redid their landscaping when they moved in. Realizing they couldn't keep up with the huge garden that the previous owners had left, they decided to bring in huge amounts of crushed rock for mulching their flower beds. That look may not be for everyone, but they made it a low maintenance yard...weeds were easy to pull up from that rock.

You have your work cut out for you if you've allowed the weeds to go to seed...you might want to whack back the worst of it and put thick layers of cardboard and /or newspapers to kill and suppress the existing weeds. Don't put down that flimsy weed fabric under your mulch - you will have a different problem on your hands. Good luck...don't be discouraged, do what you can and you'll get there eventually.

I think these days people tend to not have enough plants in their gardens, which would help to compete with weeds.

Perhaps you could first remove the biggest weeds that are about to go to seed. This will reduce the potential of a huge load of weed seed. Then plant out more plants to compete with the weeds.

I think your garden looks nice and 'cottagey'. I like a natural look.

And that's terrific advice above, to not use weed mat. Weed mat is the worst biggest pest ever. There is a thread here about it not far away.

Kentucky Blue Grass growing in the wrong place is a "weed". A rose growing in the wrong place is a "weed". "Weed" killer is not what will kill grass and in that bed you plant on renovating next year I see crab grass and a couple other types that can pretty easily be suppressed with newspaper or cardboard and a material to hold those in place, no need for plant poisons.

The other area to be allowed to grow into grass can be just kept mowed to keep the unwanted plants somewhat under control until there is more time to properly address the underlying issues.

"Weeds" are a fact of life in any yard. Seeds from unwanted plants are spread on the wind, by birds, by other animals and they grow and some people obsess about them and get illnesses over them. When you see an unwanted plant growing somewhere pull it out if you do not want it there. Plant poisons are harmful to both you and the environment. Those neat, "weedless" lawns are unnatural and an environmental disaster area kept that way by lots of poisons that adversely affect our health.

kimmq is kimmsr