#paulsyard — Public Fediverse posts

3/ Home now. Home area got hit hard. Below is a video of where we got gas this morning. There was a tractor trailer on its side close to home where it was toppled over. All of Penny's corn that was planted, 6 large raised beds worth, which had green beans growing up them are gone. uprooted and sent elsewhere. She is doing a walk-around of the house now. Cats started purring as soon as we came in the door, glad we are home. Our construction "garbage" pile was sent elsewhere. Lot of debris. The neighbors picked it all up (it was mostly in their yards) and had it all loaded on the back of a trailer ready for the dump. They were very upset about the damage to our yard and garden because it has come a long, more upset about that than the dump pile being spread out. Overall, we were blessed and in good condition. #PaulsYard. #Ohwx #wx #Ohio #Weather https://www.wlwt.com/article/brown-county-gas-station-video-storms-warning/73407928

Hope everyone has a great day. We are taking it easy today. So far, the weather is nice so might tinker in the raised garden beds or around in #PaulsYard some. The #PaulsRoof converted carport new room is almost complete, so, hopefully today the cats can get in there and see what all the fuss and commotion is about. They are going to love the full length glass door to look out of.

#SissyCat is doing better with #MillieCat but not 100% there yet. Still separating them when we leave the house for more than an hour or so.

My little #wildflower meadow is attracting all kinds of new life. #PaulsYard OMG, the crickets out there, esp with the little pond. Birds have finally moved in the bird house that was vacant ever since we put it up two years ago, even before we started the work this year on the yard. Butterflies, etc and the flowers are still establishing themselves. Anxious to see what happens next year when the meadow is established.

Going to consult for native plants to the area to fill in the beds.

4/ First batch of wildflowers in the wildflower meadow. #PaulsYard is converting to a #NoMow

You can't tell what is growing in it, but the potatoes we planted in the laundry baskets are growing beautifully. #PaulsGarden #Gardening

3/ Neighborhood cat lounging around the "pond" in #PaulsYard. Eventually the pond will get lined and nice décor around it like authentic Ohio River rock from one of the streams connecting to it and then some pond plants... It got too hot to do anything with and the wildflower meadow needs come in more

2/ Time to setup the trellis for the cucumbers so the vines have something to climb
#PaulsGarden #PaulsYard #Gardening

1/ Penny and I are peanut farmers. lol #PaulsGarden #PaulsYard #Gardening

The only thing I really do with credit is Affirm through checkouts and I am please to announce that Penny's peach tree and apple tree are finally paid for. lol. I got her those for her birthday in the spring and went with older ones that cost more because they fruit sooner and be damned if she already ate her first peach. They were juicy, too. #PaulsGarden #Gardening #PaulsYard We are in #AppalachianOhio in USDA zone 6

I got them from Fast Growing Trees.
https://www.fast-growing-trees.com/products/6-in-1-peach-tree

tl;dr Just a general update about me with 8 subjects for #FediBusyBodies... lol🤭

1) #PaulsYard and #PaulsGarden is coming along. As far as production goes, this year will probably be a bust. Fall planting and early 2027 spring planting will hopefully result in a very productive year next year. Still have some work to do, like irrigation, but it will come in the fall and winter. (If we save $$)

2/ Still haven't got the place feeling like "my space" after we had to clear most of the house out for the floor replacement.

3/ Penny is doing fine from her Widow maker heart attack. Still has limitations but she survived it and is making the best out of the limitations. August will be two years already. The #Fediverse helped me greatly to get through it. The time she was in the hospital I was never alone because of you folks and Hashtag game players.❤️

4/ My recent Spinal Baclofen Pump replacement surgery went smoothly, pain minimum, and no sign of infection a week in. My overall health is stable but there has been some progression in my Parkinson's plus, Multiple System Atrophy, but not at the speed that is average. My progression is way slower and they are trying to figure out why to see if they can replicate it for other people with it.

5/ Taking care remotely of an 85-year-old aunt is a hard thing to do and we are preparing for her now to move in here at some point. We are finishing the new room from #PaulsRoof into a suite for her. Two 180 miles round trips per week in the summer is taking its toll on me.

6/ #SissyCat still won't accept #MillieCat into the family and a few months in, we are at our wits end. Sissy's overall demeanor has change.

7/ Got my self-hosting home lab setup with some #FediFriends help. Got a lot of work to do still but I already migrated MS OneDrive and Google Drive over to it. So the degoogling will be done

8/ Knock on wood, but there seems to be a truce in effect in #PAulsRaccoonWar. For whatever reason, they walk on the edge of my property, but are getting into two neighbors home. I am thinking our place is not worth the aggravation.

That's about it.

This year, my wife decided to plant a patch of peanuts to make homemade peanut butter and they are growing! I'll get a picture tomorrow. #PaulsYard #gardening

@ai6yr do you have access to recent US images? I've been searching for a recent birdseye of my house since we did #PaulsRoof last fall and some of #PaulsYard since Spring and still learning how to grab recent ones either free or low cost

If you are doing any yard work, work on your home or apartment, need decent furniture, all at a decent price and live near a Habitat for Humanity Restore, check it out before going to a big box retailer... I can testify that they have saved us a lot of money. They are open to the public also and their profits goes for a good purpose. Many retailers donate old stock to them. #PaulsYard #PaulsRoof

https://www.habitat.org/restores

They are in #Canada, also https://habitat.ca/en/restore/find-a-restore

2/ If you have been following #PaulsYard #PaulsGarden, here is a before from March 15 and a drone air view around the end of May 2026. More life in the space has occurred since then.

Roses are growing, peaches are on the peach tree, the wildflower meadow is growing in and has its first flowers ... The lazy river pond is dug and outline to the "river" is made. #Gardening #Environment #NoMow

Not only is it going to be easy for us to maintain our yard despite our health issues, even I will be able to participate, it is going to be good for the environment.

Last photo is from today...

We have done a lot with the yard with a $500 budget, stuff donated, bargain bins and the Habitat for Humanity Restore shop

We got the corn and peanuts planted late. We're hoping El Niño will extend the planting season. June 15th was really the latest we could do.

We got a food grade tank given to us that we are going to use to capture rain water from the gutters from the water barrel overflows.

My brother was an avid gardener with a greenhouse. His daughter is letting me have "pick of the litter" so we might have a good solar powered irrigation system to install for the raised beds.

Everything we planted is in raised beds, even the corn and peanuts.

Penny is looking forward to making peanut butter. lol

#PaulsYard New tag: #PaulsGarden

Some neighborhood teens were walking by yesterday and asked if Penny had anything for them to do and she threw them a few bucks to dig out the little water feature that I posted we wanted to do after we found the small pond liner at Habitat For Humanity ReStore for $4.00. I think the mouth on one side needs to be bigger but mostly it is 4 feet deep!. It did collect draining water overnight. Eventually, it will get lined, river rocks from the Ohio River edging, some "pond plants", etc and it will help water the non-edible raised flower beds. Oh, #wildflowers meadow in the center is growing!
#PaulsYard #gardening #NoMow
https://oldfriends.live/@paul/116689624486493012

2/ Somebody asked me if I was going to have the stakes to the edging cut off. I told them we are going to have them cut down and leveled but we plan of putting hooks on each to hold the string of holiday solar lights. #PaulsYard

As my #PaulsYard followers know, I've been working with a fig tree that started as a cutting that my late brother gave me and it is doing good. He was starting a fig "orchard" in his back yard before he passed away.

I got to get his fig trees and will continue on with his "orchard" here.

All told, I have a round ten potted fig #trees of various sizes.

For Penny's birthday, she got a #peach #tree that was grafted from an older tree so it would bear fruit sooner.

To our surprise, we have a baby peach already! It wasn't planted all that long ago.

Also note, the wildflowers are starting to grow in the no-mow yard! We are letting nature do the edges with whatever comes up and thanks to the generosity of the birds doing the "seeding" LOL

#PaulsYard #Gardening

Our intent for #PaulsYard #Wildflower #NoMow #garden space was to put a little water feature-like "pond" with a solar fountain in that odd box area at the end where the raised beds start, to also use as a retention pond to water the raised beds with a rock "river" leading to it because the area slopes a small bit and we don't want a ditch to erode on its own. (see red markings)

Retail prices, solar fountain pump not included, for the "pond" was around $150. Habitat For Humanity Restore had the one we needed, in the size we needed, new, that was donated for the high price of only $4. FOUR DOLLARS! Woo-Hoo. That was going to be on the wish list for like Christmas or birthday. #gardening

My neighbor is selling their house and had a new Birdseye view taken. As a result, #PaulsYard is in the pic.

It looks awesome!

If you zoom into the raised beds you can see the plants growing. #gardening

The new #PaulsRoof looks good too. That back portion is three years old. I wished we had been able to match the new darker black with the back grey. The white old tin is on the agenda to be replaced this fall when we save enough money. It is probably 60 years old and thin as heck in places

3/ Soon the rain barrels will be hooked up to the gutters. We planned it so they will be elevated from the plantings below. Let gravity do some of the work.

We are getting a tank for the back to collect around 200 gallons of gutter water that spills out from the gutter barrels and a solar pump to utilize the collected water. #PaulsYard #Gardening

2/ #PaulsYard fig trees are growing and the blackberry bushes are being dealt with. Still going with the cedar theme. #Gardening

1/ Still in the final stages, but #PaulsYard #NoMow lawn is coming together.

A random guy, in a nice car, if it matters, stopped the other day and said it is looking good. The conversation started with, "You must really hate mowing." LOL #Gardening

12 raised #Garden beds on the right

Everyday or so, I get a new feeding tube hydration gravity bag for "drinking" water.

I am going to repurpose the old ones that are swapped for new ones for the garden and hang over my plants and let them drip hydrate the garden plants.

We'll just have to fill the bags when they run low, like we have done with "Charlie." Charlie is over 36 years old.

Penny's been meaning to crochet a cover for the one hanging over Charlie.
#PaulsYard #Gardening

Wheelchair ramp has been moved from the front porch to the converted carport room. It's still unfinished inside but is the primary entrance to the home.

We have to save up for materials and labor to get that room done.
#PaulsRoof #PaulsYard

The little fig tree is a growing.

#paulsYard #gardening .

4/FYI, if you are wondering what #PaulsYard started out as, here is the previous vs work-in-progress towards our #noMow #Wildflower and raised bed #garden yard. #Gardening .

Will be glad when we tackle the roof and the front siding, tbh. That is this fall in earnest.

3/ I don't know if you noticed, but at the end of the wildflower meadow we planted a row of Rose of Sharon that we will prune into hedges.

We started them last year. The second image actually shows the flowers from the one we created this row from. #PaulsYard #Gardening #WildFlowers

2/ #PaulsYard #noMow #Wildflower #Garden photo in daytime. Will be starting the side raised fruit and vegetable garden soon. #Gardening

Legend:

1> needs spacing move.
2> Wheelchair deck and ramp is getting moved to this door.
3> only lawn, push mow battery mower for visiting doggies, clippings, etc. Will be seeded naturally.
4> Wildflower meadow
5> AC will be removed since we have low voltage HVAC now, recycled matching siding
6> Going to paint siding sandstone with hunter green for posts, doors, etc to match new room

If you are following #PaulsYard, here is the view of the front yard #NoMow #WildFlower meadow from today's work from the security camera. The front yard edging and mulch beds, that surround the meadow, is now 90% done. We call that the horseshoe.

Tomorrow, The side yard raised bed garden work begins.

The front yard when completed will have one patch of grass next to the driveway that is 6 ft wide and around 20 ft long just for any visiting dogs to have a grassy place to potty. #Gardening

I'll have Penny take extra pictures tomorrow in the daylight