Sorry my friend, the yard has been keeping me away!
I think with your leaves that they could have ground cover potential. Id slap them down on top of the straw at my place id i had them, then put the wood chips on top. Id think they would suffocate any weeds? I'm not certain, its purely speculation.
Also, it seems bokashi can basically turn anything into compost so long as it's air tight. We layed some of ours out last night for the first time. (Bokashi) with a handful of tomato plants.
Nice! I'm not to the bokashi stuff yet. This was just organic material in a box. I read the idea of using a big box to contain your compost, and used the biggest one I had. Nothing fancy, but it worked better than I imagined. Funny how I'm excited about rotten plants lol
I could definitely see using the leaves instead of cardboard. They suffocate everything wherever they naturally pile up, so that's probably a great use for them!
lol!
I've said things along the same lines over the past few months:
"never thought I could be so excited about rotting straw"
"never thought I'd be so pumped to go look at goat poop"
"never thought I'd be digging my trash into the garden"
"never....." it goes on and on.
I love how permaculture can turn garbage and refuse into beautiful things.
The garden bit about it is cool too haha ;)