Around the house

Since our new house is on 2 acres, a majority of them very wooded, we will never be done with yard work. Never.  We have accepted this but are trying to get a hand on things and get some of it under control.  Last week Mark worked on clearing out some of the little trees right behind and around our house.  There are some larger ones that we will need to have removed so they don't damage our house in a big wind storm but he was focusing on the little ones. The goal was to create a clear sight line from the house to the tree fort below.  A teacher he works with happens to live about 2 miles up the road and he has done some work clearing his property and came over to help Mark.  They cut lots of smaller trees with only one injury to Mark. A tree did not fall they way they thought it would rather it fell straight down so all the branches hit Mark as it fell. Not fun but he came out fine just had one big bruise on his back. Fortunately it did not hit his neck.  So that has been a big project.  It looks so different with the sight lines. I am glad I can be in the house or on the deck and see Jared and Lydia down playing below. I think they will be there a lot this Fall when the weather changes.

 It was really hard to see the fort before they cleared the trees.  I love how easy it is now.

We have also been working on clearing the side yard. There is this small section of property on the side of the house. It has little fence separating it from the front yard.  It is on a slope (our whole property is really) but a good space. We haven't really gone over there much as it is really overgrown and kind of out of sight but it occurred to me that it would be a nice play area for preschool so now we have been clearing it.  The previous owners had put a small little pond back there that we didn't want and some bushes.  Mark kindly built a sandbox for preschool and we put it there. We have been leveling the ground for the sandbox and trying to cut the grass/weeds.  Now I just need to decide if I want to fill it with sand (more messy and needs some kind of cover) or little rocks.

 There were more ugly bushes we ripped out.  Mark was leveling the land and had to cut up do many roots. I hope we cut them off and now prevented lots of foundation damage...

This pond was filled with rocks and lots of mucky water.  We did not want it at all. Mark shoved gross water and huge rocks out of it.

 No more crazy overgrown bush! 

This area was so overgrown!  Our "yard" sometimes feels like this, if we don't stay on top of it it will take over! But we do love having some much space.

Pond gone! 

Mark is also clearning a path for preschool. Since our basement is a walk out basement we would rather have the preschool kids use that door and not go through our house at all.  But as stated earlier, our whole property is sloped. We have been trying to figure out how to put in an affordable, lasting path.  Because of the slope it seems like most "paths" would just wash away in a rain storm. So instead of going straight down closer to the house which would be the shortest walkway he is sloping it across the "grassy weeds".  It is a big project and hopefully won't cost too much money or wash away in a big storm. I know going across instead of straight down will make a difference. He has been so kind to work on all these preschool projects for me.

Preschool path started

Besides yard work we have been working inside too.  We got the crown molding up for our cabinets and it looks really nice, much ore finished. Not there is not a gap between the top of the cabinets and the ceilings.  We also got the baseboards back in and hung a fancy pendant light.  W need to fill in all the nail gun holes with putty and re-paint the crown molding but we will get there.  We are probably ] 95% done now. I love our kitchen.

We had some non work fun too.  We have been playing lots of hide n go seek and are so happy to live  in a house with lots of good hiding places. Jared and Lydia ask to play all the time. Its a fun family activity.  They are also very into science experiments so I am trying to get back in the habit of doing them.  

This one was experimenting with water.  We colored some water pink and some blue then dropped it into different substance.  Water, saving cream, oil and vinegar.  Oil was the most fascinating to them as the two would of course not mix.  It was fun.

And we celebrated Mark's birthday.  I made crepes for breakfast while he slept in and we had a birthday BBQ with some friends.  He wanted tri-tip and grilled vegetables for his birthday dinner and he did a great job making it. I did make his ice cream cake and it turned out great.  It was great to have the space to have more than just one family over.  We hope to do it a lot more in our fantastic kitchen/dining room. We love celebrating Mark and are so glad he is ours.