There are a number of ways to make keeping your pond maintenance more efficient without the outrageous price your handyman puts on the job. The first problem of fine leaved Honey Locust leaves could be solved by making a screen sided or mesh sided basket to put into the top section of the pond to collect the leaves. Just leave it in place between cleanings. If you are handy, the screen sided bucket is simple enough but premade mesh fish nets come in some rather large sizes and shaping the handle to serve as a cup type handle is easy enough as is making some sort of shelf to hold the net in place. Just lift the net out by the handle, let the water drain back if it is sufficiently clear and dump the leaves out. I am putting in a link for a website that happens to show several products on the same page that would do a good job of cleaning the mulm under the bottom drain. The fish capture nets are there, too. The Muck Vac is about as simple as it gets. The price is a bit steep but it works. All you need is 50 lbs water pressure in the hose. The leaf vac uses a bag to catch debris and I use one to collect leaves on the bottom. It isn't as good for mulm unless you get the extra bags for that purpose. The price is hard to beat. It adds water to your pond so prepare as for a water change. The Python pond vac is a more elaborate version of the Muck vac designed to collect leaves and mulm. It is more difficult to get into tight places and I have a problem opening and closing the jar that collects the debris because my hands hurt a lot. The pond vacuum on this page is pretty expensive but you can get a garage(utility)vac with a continuous flow(water)discharge for between $75 and $90. It works, too. Just add a hose to run the water to the garden. I got one at Walmart and I've seen them at Lowes, Menards, etc. It took me a while to get the hang of it but Horton came through for me with proper instructions. UV, UV. Hum-mm. I don't see anywhere the flow rate would be low enough to let the UV work. I see you have valves all through the system that makes in-line space at a premium even if it lets you adjust the flow. It seems to me that adding another pipe with a valve to control that flow would make the system complicated to the point of maintenance inefficiency and it would certainly raise the scream level. Maybe I am wrong. Since you are going to move, I would use a small submersible pump and a stand alone UV + filter. It might even be possible to get by with only the sponge included prefilter to protect the pump. The object is to increase dwell time to allow the UV time to work. You can get small fountain pumps for cheap. Try Harbour Freight.I found the UV and filter from Laguna on sale for 45 bucks. several years ago. That screwdriver must be a sign of ingenuity or ineptitude. I don't know which. One of these days you will laugh at it. In a number of stores I see wire shelves that are stackable in the laundry and storage departments. I don't see how deep the hole is but I bet you could find one of those shelves that would fit close enough. You might need to do a bit of bending or cutting. Please do not put stones on the bottom of the pond. It will make cleaning an impossible task and eventually the water will become stinky. Now I will let the smart guys take over. I still like your pond. Sandy Here is a link that might be useful: Simple inexpensive ideas that work well

It's the case that your front yard will never look nice if you don't get the lawn (grass or groundcover) into good shape. It's the largest "plant(s)" and having it be scarred up destroys the look of anything else that might look nice. I agree with Laceyvail's comments about how the walk approaches the house. It should be farther from the house, approaching it from the front, giving more depth to the bed that is left of the stoop. Many times people don't like to change such things because it costs $$, so it's mentioned in case you are willing to correct a condition in spite of cost, or in case you're faced with designing a walk for the next house, or for others who find this thread and wish to learn about avoiding mistakes. I actually don't mind an "S" curve shape to the walk. If we were starting from scratch, I probably would have made that curve stronger, allowing more depth in the bed near corner of the house, and placed the small tree on that side of the walk. But now we're dealing with what is. Here's a basic configuration in regard to arrangement of elements. Keep in mind that I cannot really see how much shade the tree produces. Where you place groundcover vs. grass will depend on where light exists. If you have no real light to speak of, it may be the case that your entire front yard would be better off being groundcover than grass. If you have light, you can have grass. Also, the tree is large and even though I can't see it, I see low hanging branches. I'm sure you could stand to (need to) remove lower limbs and branches which would have the effect of letting more light below which would help plants at the ground prosper. Color is used to differentiate one object from the next ... not as a suggestion of what color you should have things be. (The small, multi-trunk trees would be made from large shrubs.)

First, keep in mind that your aisles are most likely 3" narrower than you show on your layout. The aisle widths appear to be measured cabinet-to-cabinet, which is incorrect (don't feel bad, many KDs and other professionals make the same mistake.) Aisle widths are measured to/from the items that stick out the farthest into the aisle on each side. So, with 1.5" overhangs on each side, that's 3" less of aisle width. My recommendation is to go ahead and move the island to an aisle no less than 48" (when properly measured). 50" is fine as well. I agree that 60" (or 57") is too wide to comfortably use if you need to go back & forth b/w the sides of the aisle. I have to say that you appear to have a lot of wasted counterspace - wasted b/c it's not located where it's useful for prepping, cooking, or cleaning up. It could be useful as a drop zone or junk collector... Personally, I'd rather do something like this: The corner b/w the range and refrigerator could also be a Tea/Coffee Center, if you need/want one. . Zone Map: . This is assuming you can move the windows - you did say it's a new build...

I swear nobody around here has heard of core aerating. I want to move there! Far too many people here think it is a panacea and solution to hard soil. Instead of clinging to that crutch, try this. Spray shampoo at a rate of 100 cc per 100 square meters. Your English is so good I'm going to assume you're a Yank living overseas. That converts to 3 ounces per 1000 square feet. Then water 1/2 inch to 1 inch and give it 3 weeks for the magic to happen. Since you're already feeding with organics, it should work quickly. I think your soil test is going to provide the solution. I am often luke warm on soil tests unless you've done all the organic stuff and it didn't work. Something isn't right and I'm going to guess it is salt balance. It could be something worse like too much boron or copper in the soil. The soils in the upper desert of Southern California are too rich in boron to be a good place for plants. Those micro nutrients are good up to a point and then they become a poison. Waiting until May should be fine for fertilizing. Fertilizing early with organics should not have been a big problem. The way they work the microbes would have begun slowly converting the protein into plant food for the plants as needed. Do you reseed the thin areas every fall? If your climate is anything like western Washington, you might be able to seed in the spring and not get summer weeds. How warm does it get in the summer?