Reality Is Inaccurate: In other news... how to kill your grass

Time has moved on and while I am still not 100% pain free (knee/foot) I can at least walk now like a somewhat normal person. Walking normally doesn't seem like that much of a big deal until you can't do it anymore.

I've been spending a lot of time and effort latey, researching plants for my yard. I wanted a couple of things:
1) Drought tolerant
2) Looks really great without doing major hours of work every week
3) Supports the ecosystem (birds, bees, hummingbirds, etc.)

As I started looking at drought tolerant plants, I found out about Mediterranean climates (of which California is one of only a few in the world). Essentially, this is a climate that has hot, dry summers and cool, wet winters. There are approximately 6,000 plants that are native to California. However, you can only find approximately 3 of them at your local. nursery. So, most of the plants that are available to the casual gardener are plants that have to be watered in the summer, fertilized (most of California has very poor soil compared to say, the east coast) and otherwise require a lot of work. If you do a California native plant garden, you have to do more work up front (finding the plants) and less afterwards. The idea is, the right plant in the right place. Also, you have to decide where you want plants that are ok with being watered and plants that are not. It seems obvious when I think about it. If you can kill a plant that needs water by not watering it, you can also kill a plant that is drought tolerant by watering it.

I also decided NO lawn in the front of my house, which meant I had to somehow kill off the pathetic grass that was already there. I researched on the web and found out about Sheet Mulching. I was trying to figure out where to get enough cardboard, when my brain belatedly kicked in and reminded me I had approximately 1000 boxes left over from moving. Basically, get whatever you want gone nice and wet (green if possible) this helps the composting process. Next, lay down cardboard. Finally, cover in at least 6" deep of mulch. Here's some pics of the process.

Here's the load of free mulch I got from a tree service I found on Craigslist. For scale, the retaining wall on the left is about 4 foot high. Yes. This pile of mulch is bigger than my car. (I started doing this a year ago, I have 1/2 of the pile left... mulch for a lifetime.)