Behind the Scenes with Jim and Laura when not working

Jim and Laura from Standing Out in Ohio podcast take a break from real estate topics to share what they do when they're not working their irregular and demanding schedules. They reveal their passion projects and hobbies that help them maintain balance while running their successful Ohio-based business.

• Laura has planted over 50 fruit and nut trees including apple, pear, peach, nectarine, and quince varieties
• Extensive berry plantings include thornless blackberries that yield 10-20 gallons per plant
• Jim manages the property by building structures, maintaining trails, and implementing water management systems
• The property attracts diverse wildlife including wild turkeys and a bobcat
• They operate Trothwood Forest, a small private campground with secluded sites perfect for nature lovers
• The chicken coop Jim built is now producing seven eggs daily
• Both are still unpacking boxes from their recent move while managing all these projects

Visit homeinspectionsinohio.com or jimtroth.com and click on podcast for more information and follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Standing Out in Ohio
• 1:24 Irregular Working Hours Discussion
• 2:28 Laura's Extensive Planting Projects
• 8:47 Jim's Building and Maintenance Activities
• 11:20 Trothwood Forest Camping Details
• 13:12 Closing and Contact Information

Transcript

Welcome to Standing Out in Ohio

Speaker 1 0:02

Welcome to the Standing Out in Ohio podcast, where we discuss topics, upcoming events, news and predictions with real estate professionals and entrepreneurs. Listen and learn what makes their companies and themselves stand out and gain advantages over the competition and gain market share. Subscribe for the latest news and discussion on what it takes to stand out from the crowd. Now here's your host, jim.

Speaker 2 0:31

Hey everybody, welcome to the Standing Out in a Hot Podcast. This is Jim, and Laura is with me. Hi everyone, the office, goddess, so all right, so Laura.

Speaker 3 0:40

So Jim.

Speaker 2 0:41

We work a lot, yes, Jim. We work a lot, yes, sir, and it's really not consistent hours because schedules, but it depends on the client when they need a home inspection done.

Speaker 3 0:52

Well, like last night, I was doing stuff at 930 at night.

Speaker 2 0:55

Yeah, because all of a sudden I had somebody scheduling online. So yeah, things, Things change. There's a lot of hours and then it's kind of irregular, irregular hour for the most part, especially on the evenings and weekends Very irregular. So anyway, what I thought this podcast we go, or what the heck can Jim and Laura do?

Irregular Working Hours Discussion

Speaker 4 1:21

when they're not working. Sounds like a plan, but first let's listen to this. Habitation investigation is the way to go for a home inspection in ohio. Trusted, licensed home inspectors for your needs, from radon to mold to warranties for a great home inspection, you really can't go wrong. Visit home homeinspectionsinohiocom.

Speaker 2 1:48

Alright, Laura.

Speaker 3 1:49

Jimmy.

Speaker 2 1:50

When we're not working. What the heck are we doing?

Speaker 3 1:53

Oh, you're usually annoying me.

Speaker 2 1:55

Yeah, that's my job, part of the job description. It's all playful. It's like come on, you want to go do something, let's go. As you said yesterday, you just can't stay home, can you?

Speaker 3 2:07

No.

Speaker 2 2:07

Or can't sit. Still, I can't remember what you said.

Speaker 3 2:10

You just can't stay home. You have to constantly be gone.

Speaker 2 2:12

Doing something. Doing something.

Speaker 3 2:14

Well, I wanted to stay home and do my gardening. I had seeds to plant, I had bulbs to plant, I had berries to plant.

Laura's Extensive Planting Projects

Speaker 2 2:23

One of the things you do when you're not working. You are doing a shit ton of planting In the dirt. You're grounding, I'm grounding, you're grounding. Describe all the stuff you've planted in the last, say, two years. You can sum everything up.

Speaker 3 2:47

At least 50 trees.

Speaker 2 2:50

Oh, that's more than I thought I was thinking. 35.

Speaker 3 2:53

That was the first year.

Speaker 2 2:54

That was the first year, so wow. Okay, so you plant about 50 trees. What kind of trees are these?

Speaker 3 3:01

Fruit nut Like what Apple pear Apple pear Pineapple apple nut Like what Apple? Pear Apple. Pear Pineapple apple is one, because I just had to try that one because that looked cool as heck Okay.

Speaker 2 3:13

I'll be weird.

Speaker 3 3:14

Nectarine peach plum.

Speaker 2 3:16

Wait, nectarine, does that even grow here?

Speaker 3 3:19

It's out there growing. It's one of the nicest looking ones, oh, nectarine.

Speaker 2 3:22

I was thinking tangerine. Oh, okay, okay, growing it's one of the nicest looking ones.

Speaker 3 3:26

oh, nectarine, I think I was thinking tangerine, oh okay, so okay, nectarine, just like a peach, but not fuzzy fuzzy gotcha, I messed that one up, that's cute.

Speaker 2 3:33

You're paying a quince, quince. I don't know what that even is but basically related to an apple all right, does it make good pies?

Speaker 3 3:42

I think so. So we're going to find out, we're going to find out, okay. So there's the quince, there's apples, a crap ton of apples.

Speaker 2 3:50

Peaches cherries.

Speaker 3 3:51

Peaches, cherries, I've got blueberry bushes, I've got cranberry bushes, I've got a what the heck is that word Apricot bush, apricot bush, blackberries and raspberries. A lot of the stuff that I transplanted from our old house did a great job and survived through the winter.

Speaker 2 4:14

I'm 100% down with the raspberries. What was that? I'm 100% down with the raspberries being all over the place.

Speaker 3 4:19

I just got some new thornless blackberries that I planted yesterday that are supposed to do like 10 to 20 gallons of berries on each plant.

Speaker 2 4:29

See, that's a crazy amount, but I like it.

Speaker 3 4:32

You're thinking pies, razzleberry pie, baby Blackberry and raspberry.

Speaker 2 4:36

I am all over that Sometimes I like crazy when it's beneficial.

Speaker 3 4:40

So we've got that. I've got rhubarb that I planted. I've got strawberry that I planted rhubarb that I planted. I've got strawberry that I planted. I've, of course, got my flower bed that I'm working on getting looking all nice and pretty.

Speaker 2 4:55

The flower bed near that cabin.

Speaker 3 4:56

Near the cabin.

Speaker 2 4:59

We have a little cabin that people are going to rent out for camping over the weekend, so you have a flower bed, so I've got a flower bed.

Speaker 3 5:04

In front of that I've got a bunch of like. Front of that I've got a bunch of wildflowers and herb-type plants. Going down the long driveway down a strip.

Speaker 2 5:15

That's probably like a 150-yard strip that's going to be wildflowers.

Speaker 3 5:20

And I've got some more to finish planting. I need to see what comes up, though, and see where I want to put my new seeds.

Speaker 2 5:26

I just thought it's raining so hard. It's almost like they've got washed down you may have wildflowers growing I'll have places where we didn't really desire for them to do, which is fine I can just yeah, I bought you like 800 000 wildflower seeds or something they're all planted too, baby yeah so let me think what else um I've got some peonies that I need to plant.

Speaker 3 5:47

I haven't. I love peonies, they're like one of my favorite flowers okay, you said nut trees also I have um almond and pecan and I've got, oh, white willow, um oh. There's a couple of other ones that are similar like medicinal ones. White willow is very good for um boiling the bark and making like an aspirin tea aspirin yeah that's actually where aspirin came from. Is is the willow tree yep, so you're.

Speaker 2 6:23

You're part hippie, I'm part hippie herbalist. So so it sounds like we have a lot of things that are going to be great for pies, really.

Speaker 3 6:31

And I actually already have. A couple of the guys that were working on the house have already requested pies, so as soon as they start coming in, I'm going to be making a bunch of pies.

Speaker 2 6:40

Some of those trees have been there for three years maybe.

Speaker 3 6:44

Okay, so here's the weird thing.

Speaker 2 6:45

I don't think I'll get too many, but they were not.

Speaker 3 6:48

They're not looking as good as the ones that I just planted last year. Like they came Well, the ones you planted last year those already came like six feet tall. And they looked good, like they came with dirt.

Speaker 2 7:00

They're older, so this year I get a few fruits. We did have a peach last year but we did not let that grow. I want to make sure it stays stocky and sturdy. So this year, next year, we definitely should start getting some fruit. Yeah, next year we should. Nut trees take a long time.

Speaker 3 7:19

Yeah, especially with as small as those ones are. It's going to take a few years for those to start kicking in. So when?

Speaker 2 7:25

we're not working. You are doing things out in the field or around the house planting, gardening gardening planting. I played earth bender, water bender yes, because it rained so hard. I was like watching the water flow. I was like, all right, let me dig a little, a little swale here, collect the, redirect it.

Speaker 3 7:47

Explain for the audience what a swale is, because not everybody's going to know.

Speaker 2 7:51

It is say, you got a slope that's running towards your house. Okay, you don't want all the water going through your house. So what you do before it gets to the house is you make a low spot like a little ditch, a trench. A little trench, but not as deep. It can be a gentle, where it goes down and then goes back up before it gets to your house. So it's basically a low spot that will collect the water and all the water go into there and then direct it wherever you want. So I made little tiny swales to direct things. So I've been doing a lot of chainsaw. Yesterday A tree fell across one of the trails here in the woods. Had to clean that up.

Speaker 2 8:29

So I got the chainsaw out, cut that out, get it out of the way. I did some shoveling to redirect the water so it routes appropriately away and drains well to where we want it to, or waste some areas. I recently built the chicken coop.

Jim's Building and Maintenance Activities

Speaker 3 8:45

Yep, we got that up. We got seven eggs this morning Got seven eggs this morning.

Speaker 2 8:48

Seven eggs this morning. I got a still got a bruise on my finger from I hammered myself. I only hammered finger one time during the whole project, though it's getting better, it's not not too bad getting better but a lot of what I do around here is building, helping you. I'm like all right, laura, where do these holes? So dug holes yesterday for you because you're playing with a low type of blueberry, or blackberry.

Speaker 3 9:16

It was a oh crud. What were those called Partridge berry and a dewberry?

Speaker 2 9:26

All right, I'll just see the one that, because I don't know what those are.

Speaker 3 9:29

Kind of like small short blackberries.

Speaker 2 9:32

Deer like them.

Speaker 3 9:33

Deer birds will like them yes. So we have a lot of wildlife around, so those are by the pond, so that'll be really nice for the animals near the pond, yep.

Speaker 2 9:41

We have a lot of wildlife around. We've had turkeys in the front yard, the back yard, like 10 yards from the back door, and then we had Bobcat. Had Bobcat walk through the yard.

Speaker 3 9:51

Through the side yard. I haven't seen that one again. I really want to.

Speaker 2 9:54

I got to move the trail camera. We got two new trail cameras. I want to put one right next to the house to catch that location. The other ones are kind of spread out Secret locations on those.

Speaker 3 10:04

Super secret so. But yeah, mostly a lot of it so, but yeah, mostly a lot of it like getting the grass growing.

Speaker 2 10:12

I put more grass seed out yesterday. Oh, my project now? Which? So making that, if you want to come camping down here, trothwood, just look up trothwood forest I've been building a making a little bathroom, a little latrine, not like, not like a military latrine, but like a bathroom for people to use. Guess, because the port-a-john companies, they weren't very good, so they're gone. We're doing our own thing. But I'm making. I have a solar shower which does not work well in the winter. The water's never gonna get that hot enough. You take a shower and with this system, but no with the system I have here.

Speaker 2 10:47

Nobody's answering a winner. Often Some people do, but it's designed so you can heat the water up with fire. You just build a little fire that goes about 20 minutes and you've got hot water, which is very hillbilly, but you're camping. You should not expect Hyatt Regency and a mint in your pillow If you want that?

Speaker 3 11:14

go to the Hyatt? Yeah, go to the Hyatt. If you want to get away, enjoy nature and not be around people, come camp.

Speaker 2 11:20

Yeah, and our campsites they're separated. None of them are really close together. The cabin is probably the closest to a place. All the others are you have to walk to them.

Speaker 2 11:33

You have a motorcycle a dual-purpose motorcycle that's on-road and off-road Perfect. You can drive your motorcycle right up to your campsite and then drive around the trails as well. If you really want to take your motorcycle through the woods to go bushwhacking, I'm fine if you do that. Just you know, be careful. But so what I do is kind of like tend to oversee the campground, make sure it's doing all right. We've only got like four sites, so not a whole lot there to really take care of for the most part, but I do have to cut wood, split wood, haul it around.

Speaker 3 12:07

Yeah. Don't we have somebody camping this weekend. We need to get wood set up for them.

Speaker 2 12:12

Yeah, I got wood all set. I need to take it to their campsite. He's coming on a motorcycle, so he'll be motorcycle camping. He'll be motorcycle camping, which is fun to do Now.

Speaker 3 12:21

Harley's gold ring. I would not.

Speaker 2 12:25

You would not want to take those on the trails. They're not going to work well they get the traction.

Speaker 3 12:29

I still want to see you get your gold wing down the hill our driveway is gravel so yes, it is tricky with that. So I don't see you get on a dual purpose motorcycle.

Speaker 2 12:40

Fine, that's all cool. So anyway, that's. I think it's up for this podcast, just kind of showing what jim lord doing the when they're not working putting boxes away putting boxes away. Putting boxes away.

Speaker 3 12:52

We're getting getting stuff taken out of boxes.

Speaker 2 12:54

Oh yeah, from the recent move. We're still working on that recent move, but yeah that's to be expected, that's arduous. We got to get something back to the donation place.

Speaker 3 13:03

Yeah, I've got about four boxes that I need to take back this week.

Closing and Contact Information

Speaker 1 13:11

Sounds good. All right, Thank you everybody. Bye guys. Bye-bye. You've been listening to the Standing Out in Ohio podcast. Be sure to subscribe on Spotify or Google Podcasts to get new, fresh episodes. For more, please follow us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook, or visit the website of the best Ohio home inspection company at homeinspectionsinohiocom or jimtroffcom. That's J-I-M-T-R-O-T-H, and click on podcast. Until next time, learn and go do stuff.