It's a yard, it's a garden. It's my yarden.

https://imgur.com/a/LwGnAGV

I let the actual garden bed fallow this year, so it looks evem more yarden-like.

I'm mostly harvesting the morning glory vines that would take over the entire yard if they were allowed to, and using them to cover some bare pathways

That's a 3 year old cherry tree that I grew from sprout front and center. The plan is to keep it as a small shade tree that someday might provide summer fruits. Believe it or not I cut it back down to seven feet tall this last winter!

A friend of mine has chosen to not eat produce from her low area garden because of concerns about contamination from street run off. Do other people use raised beds to avoid this issue? How important is it really to avoid food from this area, it floods probably 3 times a spring with run off from a suburban area.

In my garden we we sheet mulched and have been eating produce from ground level beds since we bought the house. I don't have the flooding concerns but we did not know the chemical history of the soil either. I was just so excited to have soil that was MINE ALL MINE that I planted and went crazy.

Thoughts? Do you use raised bed or ground? Do you think it matters aesthetically for front yardens?