I'm hoping over the course of the weekend, some of the regular posters will weigh in on this with their professional expertise. You've got an interesting prospect compared to the suburban development yard situations. There have been quite a few foundation planting threads, but the search feature is still a little erratic. And to my eye, as your house has been expanded and added on to over the years, it has grounded itself and doesn't need to be married to the site with a ring of shrubbery. For fun, I googled the images for farmhouse landscaping and was surprised to see many of the images have the house standing on its own and much of the landscaping at a distance. Nice porches competely unadorned with plant material. At a distance you could add a deciduous tree(s) for brilliant fall color or a conifer grove or an interesting island bed for annual/perennial gardening. Create an additional vista to view from the porch. When I had some massive 100+ year old basswoods removed last fall, the arborist said my arborvitae had grown beyond where they could be cut back, shaped up, etc. - kind of a shame since the only thing wrong with them is they've grown too big. So, they're on the plan to be taken out and replaced (with something) this spring. My house is a 1930's colonial and I do have the usual, not terribly imaginative foundation plantings of assorted evergreens and conifers. These have also been in the ground for 36 years and it's an annual cutting of the candles, pruning errant branches, etc. to keep them natural looking but in check. That side view of your house is nice - it's always a shock to have something taken out, but if the arborvitae were gone, I doubt you'd miss them. I'd be tempted to leave the smaller shrubbery in place for the time being but add smaller upright or pyramidal conifers as the arborvitae replacements. The bulkhead should remain unobstructed.

Ever watched the TV show "Everbody Loves Raymond"? No. When I was in middle school we moved to 8 acres next to my 70-year-old grandmother's 5 treed acres, and my cousins lived across the field. It was great. First thought: I read an article just last week about how grandmothers make children's lives better. The article says grandfathers make little difference, but having a grandmother close enough to interact with Mom /children on a regular basis means that children have an amazingly better chance of survival ... and that Mom is likely to start having children at a younger age /have more children /and those children are going to turn out better. However, once Grandma turns 75, the data begins to skew the opposite direction ... a newborn who has a Grandma 75+ has a smaller chance of survival ... the idea being, a younger grandmother is a giver /bringer of assets, resources, help, whereas an older grandmother is a taker /resource-user (that is, she needs help from her children). I found the article interesting. Second thought: I hadn't considered cousins. My cousins were always my best-best-best friends, and I would've LOVED to grow up within walking distance of them, but it gives me two thoughts: - I'm one of 24 first cousins, and I'm in the "middle cousins group", which includes five girls born close together. Throughout our childhoods, the adults "classified us". I'm the oldest of that group and everyone always called me the smart girl. The next one was the athletic girl, the next was the pretty girl, then the good /sweetest girl, and the youngest was the hopeless one who was never going to amount to anything anyway. PLEASE don't do this to your kids. I never thought about it when I was a child, and I don't think it hurt me much (I mean, being the smart girl isn't bad), but it definitely hurt some of the others. You might guess that the hopeless one hasn't done particularly well in the world, but to give another example, "the pretty girl" became anorexic -- coincidence? The family told her it was "her identity" to be pretty. - Cousins who live near each other will almost certainly go to school together too. That's a lot of togetherness. I would also make very clear that there is no "venue shopping". A child gets into a bit of trouble, maybe grounded, and parents are like SO UNFAIR :), Yes, parents need to be allowed to be parents. Over time, first one on and then the other built houses on the land and when they did, their father deeded them land for the house and additional acreage. This turned out to be very important. This makes me think of a friend of mine who's been in an ugly situation for 6-7 years. She married a man who was divorced /had a couple children, and then they had a child of their own. They lived on HIS family land, and they had cousins /grandparents in close proximity, and all was well for many years -- all the children are grown up, married, some living elsewhere. Then he died. The man was barely in the ground 'til the children from his previous marriage came to my friend saying, "When are you moving out? We'll be happy to help you move. Help you get settled -- but we're looking forward to moving into Dad's house /our house now. We're sure you understand; you're not a real family member, so get off our land." He died without a will, but as his legal wife, she inherited everything -- plus she'd lived in that house /paid the mortgage /paid for a remodel. She had thought to live in the house the rest of her life /leave it to the children together ... but after this situation went on and on, she eventually sold the family house /bought a townhouse in the city ... as you can imagine, the family fall-out has been bad. She had mistakenly thought she was on good terms with her stepchildren. Moral: If you're sharing with family, especially old family land, think beyond your own generation... don't keep your thoughts a secret, and make it legal.

I can speak to schools in New Mexico: There will be essentially no in person learning until after Labor Day. There are a few exceptions for special ed students, some K-3, which will be limited to no more than 5 kids per adult. The plan after that time is to bring kids back slowly by age group, starting with the younger ones first. I think at that time the schools will still be limited to 50% capacity, so there are cohorts of certain kids going on Monday and Tuesdays and the second group going on Thursdays and Fridays. One of my sons attends a charter high school and they say that it looks like there will not be kids on campus until October. We have also heard though that school starts August 10th but will of course be online. Connectivity is a huge issue for the state. There are many people with sub-par speeds. At my house I usually get 1 megabyte which is just ridiculously slow and not helpful. All I can do is hope that they upgrade the system, some day. At the community college, most classes will be online, except for those with a lab component. I am not as up to date on requirements for churches. The church I attend has such a small census that we are able to meet. There is no singing, all socializing is outside afterwards and everybody is masked. Most people in our group would agree that you do not need the building to worship, etc., but because of the size of our group and the connections, people needed to see each other, especially because many were otherwise quite isolated. I have been impressed with our governor for the most part. When she walked back dining rooms being open she was asked about why not go back to a total lockdown. She noted that she thought it was just not sustainable long term. I think part of that was just needing to provide people an outlet to do something, even though so many are angry and unreasonable through it all. I feel quite sorry for all those governor's who are trying to do right by their states with the limited information available because no one is happy. I look at NM though where our positivity rate is about 3-5% most days as compared to our neighbors of Texas and Arizona with much higher rates and I think well done governor.

My best friend's family is just coming out of a super spreader Thanksgiving event, where her asymtomatic niece infected all of her sister's extended family, her 82 year old mother and her other sister who cares for the mother. They supposedly were "being careful" but had some unmasked time inside due to it being so cold outside. So you can't be too careful. As for visiting, can you get tested and quarantine ahead of time? This is some new advice coming out of the CDC now due to more testing being available. So a visit involves quarantine and then testing before a visit, with quarantine and testing after. New guidelines on this are shorter than 14 asymptomatic days. I think seven is the new suggested quarantine time if testing is part of the regime. 7 days of quarantine after a negative test and you should be able to feel confident that AT THAT POINT IN TIME you are virus free. Any exposure to anyone changes that assumption. From CDC Web site: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/travelers/travel-during-covid19.html "If you are traveling, consider getting tested with a viral test 1-3 days before your trip. Also consider getting tested with a viral test 3-5 days after your trip and reduce non-essential activities for a full 7 days after travel, even if your test is negative. If you don’t get tested, consider reducing non-essential activities for 10 days after travel. Keep a copy of your test results with you during travel; you may be asked for them. Do not travel if you test positive; immediately isolate yourself, and follow public health recommendations.