I'm a bit confused, too - is the concrete stoop attached to an outbuilding, garage, shed, the back door of a neighbor's house? The concrete block looks like it might be someone else's garage. User name suggests some real closeness here but not so unusual in older urban neighborhoods. Is that all your property seen in the photos; the different fencing and wall treatments, plus the sidewalk to nowhere is all a bit hard to put together. You might get the most enjoyment and bang for your buck out of making a potager garden. From Wikipedia: "A potager garden is a French method of creating ornamental vegetable or kitchen gardens. Often flowers (edible and non-edible) and herbs are planted with the vegetables to enhance the beauty. The goal is to make the function of providing food aesthetically pleasing. Plants are chosen as much for their functionality as for their color and form. Many are trained to grow upward. A well-designed potager can provide food, cut flowers and herbs for the home with a modest amount of maintenance." Starting in on a potager would give you the best chance of making good use of the space for a modest monetary investment and would also afford you a spot somewhere in the background to start a compost pile - which is always good for organic gardening. There's a Potager Garden Forum here, people post pictures of their creative use of space. All in all, I think that might be a satisfactory solution for your yard - as you got into it, it could be as formal or casual as you want. Vines, creepers, clematis (even annual morning glories, sweet peas or the edible climbing nasturtiums) on the chain link will give you a backdrop.

Trying to picture snow... Nope it just melted. lol Congrats on your new home! I don't blame you for being anxious. I've been thinking about what I want to plant next year even though I'm struggling to keep everything watered right now in this crazy heat. I just checked your trade page and it's still blank. You need to get your want-list going. It might encourage me and others to go out and collect seeds rather than letting the birds get them.

For access issues, check out square foot gardening! In my central ohio yard, the bees really are crazy for beebalm (monarda) which is a native & comes in many colors. The also love agastache. These are both full sun. Hummingbirds have been attracted to honeysuckles (not the invasive kind) and trumpetvines (warning, do not plant this unless you want to cover a large and very sturdy structure, and battle its desire to take over the world), also salvias. You must already have things that attract and feed them, though, if they were nesting there. There is a hummingbird forum too; I'm sure they have more info. I sure do wish that I had so much land! I would be planting more fruit trees/shrubs, and one of everything else!

Unfortunately I was not able to get any great garden pics. We saw them all mostly while driving and on the train. This is not the best one by far, but this was next to the parking lot at the supermarket. A few olive trees were in everyone's yards. Wildflowers. The tall yellow ones that look like forsythia were growing everywhere, as were the red poppies.