Well I about died getting it done-- all the work today was work requiring a second pair of hands so I worked HARD for a good long shift in the fresh air and sunshine-- I got all pinked up!
Pen #1 holds doggies, and I must say that for all-scrounged materials, it's pretty good-looking and bigger than it looks; when it gets its gravel it will seem much bigger and clean up well. A few finishing details to pretty it up remain, but they were in there for a bit this afternoon. They'll spend all day in there tomorrow (MIL allergic to dogs AND the dogpoop-dust that came in thru their door out to the old pen).
Demo on the old pen has begun. A design for the new pen is emerging that will, before very long, also give us a privacy fence between our "back" yard and the busy road.
In the spring the privacy section of that fence will be a wonderful trellis of climbing veggies and tomatoes in pots-- that'll be the privacy factor. I had gotten a couple-dozen huge nursery pots awhile back via Freecycle, and only lacked the trellis and topsoil. I will be able to do all the planting up at a comfy sitting height, potting one huge pot at a time while the dogs play around me.
A BIG asset arrived today. When our friend's wife died, it freed up a wheelchair she had not been using for some time, and the family has been sortiong all her things and giving away most of it so that when EEd is ready to sell up he will have already sorted out the trailer they shared. He's taking his time to enjoy the memories attached to each item they sort through, but this chair had become a bulky item they wanted out of the way, and it came here today. I'll use it to sit in as I clean my house, and think often of her, especially her gardening and love of working outdoors. The just-completed cleaning was done from my rolling office chair and it WORKED. This wheelchair has bigger wheels to get over some rough flooring changes so I will not kill the good desk chair trying to scoot it across those. (Our church's thrift shop does wheelchair pass-alongs with other area churches for people in need-- there is a huge surplus right now so I am not worried about hoarding a needed chair someone in greater disability could use.) And when I no longer need it, I'll find a good home for it.