And now it was time to say goodbye to the mobile home where I lived in the village of Lakemont in Altoona, Pennsylvania. I bought this trailer new in 2000 and was completely happy with my purchase. Thirteen years later, my wife and I were headed west for the next chapter of our lives.

From June 11, 2003: Saying goodbye to the trailer in PA . . .

I moved to Columbia, Missouri in June 2003 so my then-wife could go to Graduate School and get her PhD. We upgraded from the trailer in Lakemont to a small house in a nice neighborhood on the city's north side.

From July 25, 2003: The front yard of our new home . . .

I don't remember why I was up on the roof on this day back in September 2003. But I did bring a camera with me and took a few pics of the yard from a different perspective.

From September 20, 2003: Aerial pics taken from the roof . . .

April 7, 2010: My then-wife and I moved into our new home in the summer of 2009. I didn't do anything in the way of "gardening" in those days, and was mainly concerned with keeping what was in place neat and tidy. The photo above shows the bare front yard as it appeared in April 2010.

April 10, 2010: A bare front yard. At that time in my life, I had no interest in having anything in the front yard other than the grass that was already in place.

April 17, 2010: Another view of the bare front yard. My goal was to keep the lawn mowed and the overall appearance of the yard neat and orderly.

June 6, 2015: Quite a bit had changed in the 5 years that have passed since the first set of pics was taken. The originally bare front yard was now filled with a bunch of flowers and trees. Instead of merely keeping up appearances, I had begun to experiment with a primitive form of actual landscape design.

A friend of mine gave me some more "mystery bulbs" over the summer. I planted them in the fall in the area next to the garage for no reason other than I wanted to see what would happen with them when spring rolled around.

I have no idea what they are. But the unusual warmth has them confused. They began growing not too long after I planted them in the fall of 2015.

November 14, 2015: I took advantage of the warm weather to mulch some debris in the yard and used it to expand my "random curved shape."

I moved the Small Anise Tree earlier in the fall to a location more suitable for its size. There was plenty of debris in the yard for enough homemade mulch to connect everything together.

This means my "random curved shape" now has a 90 degree elbow.

When spring arrives, I'll mulch up the winter debris and create more of a border around everything. But for now, this will be fine.