I recently re-read Barbra Streisand’s first book called “My Passion for Design,” which was particularly inspiring as I’m literally rebuilding my house that burned down. On her barn house she had a 14-foot water wheel installed, so I looked around at the various replacement water features I’m going to have in my backyard and found this fabulous fiberglass number which is even more beautiful in person than I could have imagined, and larger than I expected. I’m joking that rather than having a 14-FOOT water wheel, mine is 14 inches, but that’s fine. The sensation and pleasant sounds are the same. There are other inspirations she’s given me like avoiding some harsher colors and lighting and collecting cranberry glass.

While this model came with an electric plug, after my house fire experience which initiated from the general area where I had an electric fountain, I will replace all fountain electric plugs with solar power. I already have two fountains with this, and it was very inexpensive to purchase a separate power source with a solar panel to power them. It simplifies the wiring, and placement in the garden and doesn’t have any chance of causing a chain reaction that could cause an electrical short or sparks.

Hummingbirds are now regularly using the solar-powered artichoke-shaped fountain to stop fluttering, drink, and bathe. I happened to be sitting in the best spot when I took this footage.

New location for solar spinners, and new configuration:

This was almost dismissed as a weed, was at my real home, but Shea noticed it was a tomato plant. Now it’s about to turn red, which is exciting. It’s the first tomato I’ve actually helped grow, although there were several tomato plants producing when I first moved into my home from the previous owner.

Below you can see the two solar trees that I’m testing out. Their solar panels might have been covered for months by foliage or dirt.

We brought some plants from my home to the rental to work on repotting, etc. I’m using a donated Ethan Allen dining room table as my garden table, which I feel guilty about, but it is slightly warped and the chairs that came with it had some mold, so I discarded them without thinking months ago. In hindsight, they probably would have been worthwhile to re-upholster, but things were moving so quickly right after the fire and I made a lot of rash decisions.

Everything I do in this yard is to stage for my own home. I’m trying to enjoy the serenity of it even though I resent being here. I’d rather be at my house, but there is no electricity. At least at my house, there is some outdoor furniture that is comfortable to sit on and potable water from the hose. I don’t really need wifi since I have a mobile network, but it’s just not the same.

Even some of the new furniture I bought I now have some buyer’s remorse about. For example, the extra large recliner was a death trap. I can barely get out of it with all the strength in my legs. The dining room table I bought new looked perfect in the catalog, but what I could not see was that the tiny grooves on the top do nothing but collect crumbs and make the table impossible to wipe down. It’s like going backward to a tiled countertop after having quartz.

I did a lot more pruning of plants like the rosemary and the younger plum tree so I can see the old fountain and cleared the metal steps. Watering the plants will hopefully make a huge difference, especially because I have never seen the lemon tree so distressed before. I ended up taking the most stressed small plants back to the rental for some TLC.

I unplugged some of the outdoor items like an Alexa, outdoor lights and the large fountain. I’ll bring the two solar trees to the rental to see if they are working also. One of them flickered on, so that would be a nice win.

I’m still finding random melted metal pieces that I don’t recognize from the “before time,” which might be an artistic touch to the garden at some point. Maybe I’ll make one piece out of several melted pieces.

Here’s a sign that progress is being made: the steps outside of the side yard:

Today marks four years since I bought my house and moved to Vallejo during COVID, before the vaccine, and during the fires that made the skies bleak and orange, as you can see in this picture taken at the time!

So much has happened since then, but I have no regrets about moving to this city and community that has been so kind to me. I still love the house I chose, even though it’s in pieces and has months left to be rebuilt since the January fire. I’m looking forward to finally having the housewarming I never got to have, hopefully sometime in 2025.