Yard Plotted to scale, promise

Alien Invasion · L-Shaped with Projecting Garage

Alien Invasion layout for a L-Shaped with Projecting Garage

Something landed on the lawn and it is still here. A saucer low over the grass, a beam of green light, and small gray visitors standing very still in places they should not be.

your l-shaped with projecting garage, 62′ × 28′ 7 of 11 spots filled
To-scale site plan for a L-Shaped with Projecting GarageA to-scale overhead site plan of a l-shaped with projecting garage, 62 feet of street frontage by 62 feet deep, with the house set back 26 feet from the front sidewalk. The street runs along the top of the drawing. 7 of 11 marked positions are filled. Filled: the star; sidekick, left; sidekick, right; walk and alcove lights; roofline, both planes; the garage wall; under the porch roof. Left empty: deeper, off to one side; along the eaves; porch posts and rail; the front door. STREETDRIVEHOUSEGARAGE62'ABmax 6'Cmax 6'DEFPmax 8'Hmax 6'TRWmax 6.7'

Drawn to scale. Everything is measured in feet from the front sidewalk, and your front door is 80″ tall if you need something to check against.

this theme on this shape

Alien Invasion fills 7 of this shape's 11 marked spots for free, and all of them once every budget is unlocked.

One of the pieces here is rated by its maker for covered use only, and this shape has a spot under a roof to put it, which is why it can be in the plan at all.

first, the deal with your yard

Read this before you buy anything

The garage is the front of your house whether you like it or not. It is closer to the street than anything else, it is wider than the door, and headlights hit it first. Fighting that is a losing game, so decorate it on purpose. The reward for this shape is the alcove: a recessed corner with walls on two sides that shelters things from wind and frames whatever you put in it. The risk is that the alcove is also in shadow, and anything unlit in there is invisible from the street.

Who's looking, and from where

  • Straight on from the street, where the garage dominates
  • From the driveway looking into the alcove
  • The angle down the block, where only the garage face shows

The classic mistake

Treating the entry as the center of the house and spacing everything around it. The entry is off to one side. Symmetry built around it looks lopsided from the street.

Check this one thing

Keep everything out of the garage door swing and off the apron where it meets the drive. An up-and-over door needs more clearance in front of it than people expect.

same yard, four budgets

Pick your number

Every version below was worked out against the map up there, and nothing gets a spot unless it physically fits. Footprint and height both. The Do it yourself version is free and complete, so you can go do that today. The other three are the paid guide.

Every price below was checked on or after 27 September 2026, and each item carries its own date. Holiday pricing moves weekly.

Do it yourself Free

stays under $250
$196.89 $53.11 to spare

One weekend, a sheet of plywood and some string lights. Costs almost nothing and still stops traffic.

The Do it yourself plan: every piece, its spot on the drawing, how big it is, how many and what it costs.
Spot What to get How big How many Cost
A 5 ft Inflatable Meditating Alien (opens in a new tab) Amazon
The star. In the alcove, out from the front door and clear of the garage wall. The garage sticking forward has already built you a three-sided room. Put the best thing you own inside it. This one works just as well mirrored to the other side of the walk, so if a tree, a slope or the way you come and go says the far side is better, swap it and swap its partner with it. What matters is that it is beside the path and not standing in it.
5' 1" H 1 $39.99
B 14 in. Alien Tree Peeker (opens in a new tab) Amazon
Sidekick, left. This one hangs rather than stands, so it wants a tree trunk, a post or a fence at about head height. It also does not light up, so put one of the green spotlights at the foot of whatever it is peering round. Unlit it disappears completely after dark, which rather defeats it.
1' 2" H 1 $19.99
C 8 x 12 in. Alien Warning Sign (opens in a new tab) Amazon
Sidekick, right. This one is not a lawn object, so do not put it on the lawn. Two zip ties onto a garden stake, a fence picket or the mailbox post, at about chest height, right where the walk meets the sidewalk. Face it up the walk rather than at the road: a warning works on the person deciding whether to come closer, and every visitor passes within a foot of that spot. Eight by twelve inches reads at three feet and at no distance beyond that, which is the whole reason it goes there and nowhere else.
1' H 1 $9.96
D Green Solar Path Stakes, 10 pack (opens in a new tab) Amazon 10 pieces
Walk and alcove lights. Both sides of the walk, then turn the corner and run along the base of the garage wall. That turn is what stops the alcove from going black.
1' 3" H 2 $51.98
E Cool White LED Mini Lights, 100 count (opens in a new tab) Amazon 100 pieces
Roofline, both planes. Main roofline and the garage roofline, which sit at different depths. Lighting only the back one makes the garage look like a shadow stuck to the front of your house.
2" H 2 $51.98
F Lawn Crop Circle Build it
The garage wall. Put it where the plan marks the secondary scene, but treat that marker as the center of the ring rather than the footprint: it is twelve feet across and wants clear grass all round. Keep it off the walk and away from the flower beds, and light it from the far side at ground level so the laid-over grass catches the light. Lit from above it disappears.
0" H 1 $14
P 8 in. Area 51 Metal Sign (opens in a new tab) Amazon
Under the porch roof. On the wall beside the door rather than on the floor, at eye height, straight rather than tilted. This is the cheapest plan in the theme and the porch is the one place where nine dollars can do as much work as ninety: at arm's length nobody can tell what a prop cost, and a sign that says the government has been here does more for the story than a small figure standing in the dark would. Do not light it separately. Whatever is already lighting your door is the right amount.
8" H 1 $8.99
the plug situation

3 things need an outlet, about 1.2 amps all together. 1 of them run all night. Inflatable blowers do not take breaks. That all fits on one 15 amp circuit, you are fine. Outdoor GFCI outlets only, and leave a drip loop in the cord at every plug so rain runs off instead of in.

You will also need

The cord is the part everybody forgets, and stores run out of them at the peak of every season. Outdoor rated only, and plugged into a GFCI outlet.

About $61.93 of hardware, on top of the $196.89 of decorations. Buy it once and it comes back out every year.

Image prompt for this exact list
Photorealistic evening photograph of a two-story suburban with an attached front-facing garage house on a l-shaped with projecting garage, 62 ft of street frontage with a 26 ft front setback, photographed from the street at a slight angle toward the entry side, so the forward-projecting garage and the recessed front door alcove are both visible, camera height 5.5 ft. The yard is decorated in a alien invasion theme. Something landed on the lawn and it is still here. A saucer low over the grass, a beam of green light, and small gray visitors standing very still in places they should not be. Decorations, in position: 1. The star: a lit green inflatable alien sitting cross-legged with a huge head and black almond eyes, glowing from inside, 5.1 ft tall. In the alcove, out from the front door and clear of the garage wall. The garage sticking forward has already built you a three-sided room. Put the best thing you own inside it. This one works just as well mirrored to the other side of the walk, so if a tree, a slope or the way you come and go says the far side is better, swap it and swap its partner with it. What matters is that it is beside the path and not standing in it. 2. Sidekick, left: a small green alien peering out from behind a tree trunk, only its head and hands showing, 1.2 ft tall. This one hangs rather than stands, so it wants a tree trunk, a post or a fence at about head height. It also does not light up, so put one of the green spotlights at the foot of whatever it is peering round. Unlit it disappears completely after dark, which rather defeats it. 3. Sidekick, right: a tall narrow metal warning sign reading Proceed At Your Own Risk with an alien on it, fixed to a porch post at head height, 1 ft tall. This one is not a lawn object, so do not put it on the lawn. Two zip ties onto a garden stake, a fence picket or the mailbox post, at about chest height, right where the walk meets the sidewalk. Face it up the walk rather than at the road: a warning works on the person deciding whether to come closer, and every visitor passes within a foot of that spot. Eight by twelve inches reads at three feet and at no distance beyond that, which is the whole reason it goes there and nowhere else. 4. Walk and alcove lights: 2 of them, a line of short stakes throwing sickly green light up the edges of a path, the color of something radioactive rather than something growing, 1.3 ft tall. Both sides of the walk, then turn the corner and run along the base of the garage wall. That turn is what stops the alcove from going black. 5. Roofline, both planes: 2 of them, a run of tiny blue-white bulbs following a roofline, cold and bright against the dark like frost catching a streetlight, 0.2 ft tall. Main roofline and the garage roofline, which sit at different depths. Lighting only the back one makes the garage look like a shadow stuck to the front of your house. 6. The garage wall: a wide flattened ring in a lawn at night, the grass laid over in one direction so it catches a low green light from the side, 0 ft tall. Put it where the plan marks the secondary scene, but treat that marker as the center of the ring rather than the footprint: it is twelve feet across and wants clear grass all round. Keep it off the walk and away from the flower beds, and light it from the far side at ground level so the laid-over grass catches the light. Lit from above it disappears. 7. Under the porch roof: a small square metal road sign reading Area 51 with an alien on it, screwed flat to a door or a post, 0.7 ft tall. On the wall beside the door rather than on the floor, at eye height, straight rather than tilted. This is the cheapest plan in the theme and the porch is the one place where nine dollars can do as much work as ninety: at arm's length nobody can tell what a prop cost, and a sign that says the government has been here does more for the story than a small figure standing in the dark would. Do not light it separately. Whatever is already lighting your door is the right amount. Shot at dusk with the sky still faintly blue, every lit decoration switched on and brighter than anything else in the frame, warm light spilling onto the lawn. Palette: #7BC043, #2B2118, #8A6FBF, #D6E85A. Nothing floats; every piece sits on the ground at the stated distance. Scale reference: the front door is 80 inches tall.

see it first

The other two prompts

Each budget above has its own prompt for the finished yard, because each one is a different list of things. These two do not change between budgets: one for the empty yard so you have a before picture, and the negative prompt that stops every image model on earth from burying your lawn in snow you did not ask for.

the free ones keep coming

New plans go up through the season

The Do it yourself version above is free and complete, and every theme that goes up gets one, drawn for all ten yard shapes. That is 10 free plans per theme, and the list grows through the season.

One email when there is something new. Nothing else, ever.