Today my husband, a friend of ours, and I cleaned out the back yard. Now this may sound very mundane, however you have to understand the history of our back yard.
Last year, we decided we wanted to do a sort of makeover of the back yard. We had a friend come over with a backhoe and tear everything up. He pulled out the concrete slabs with the pipes in them that were clotheslines anchors, and turned over the entire yard. However, for a variety of reasons, we never got around to finishing the project. The concrete and pipes sat at the end of our driveway. The ground remained "bumpy" (to say the least) and the weeds moved in and took over. Mowing the lawn was an ordeal, because we don't own a mower, and with the "bumpy" condition of the ground, it was difficult to maneuver a mower anyway.
I finally got sick of looking at the jungle in the back. There were Queen Ann's lace that were taller than me. It was getting difficult to see the house in the back of us. It was pretty pathetic. Our dear friend borrowed his sister's DR Trimmer (this thing ROCKS, by the way), loaded up his van with all sorts of tools and equipment and came over at 8am. He got right to work "trimming" through the vegetation, while my husband and I helped clear out some of the junk around the edges. We chopped down a couple of small trees, cut down random seedlings that were growing in the patio cracks, and raked, bagged and dragged all of the cuttings to the front curb. A total of about 10 yard bags are filled, and waiting to be taken away. We then covered the entire yard with tarps, and sprayed Round-up around the edges of the house and on anything that was left exposed. Kill it off and start over- that's the plan! The concrete was loaded into our friend's van to be taken to the dump. In a little less than 4 hours, we finished part 1 of the transformation. How wonderful!
I'm not big on physical labor. I'm not an extremely strong person (muscle-wise), and I'm not very big. I can be a little lazy, and I'm a procrastinator. All these reasons contributed to my avoidance of finishing what was started last summer with a backhoe. However, with all that said, once I start doing physical work, I usually work hard and enjoy it. I like working with my hands and seeing progress being made. I like learning how to do new things and being able to do things for myself. I enjoy the feeling of accomplishment knowing that I completed something.
I'm excited to plan what to do next with the yard. The purchase of a storage shed is in the near future, I'm going to start a compost pile, and I'm consulting with my gardening friends as to what plants to use to decorate. The kids want some berry bushes and/or a vegetable garden. And we have to have sunflowers! I'm aiming to have this project finished (or at least mostly finished) in a month or two so we can actually enjoy a new back yard before the snow flies. And I'm looking forward to having a use-able yard that the kids can play in and we can all enjoy.
I can honestly say that manual labor would not have been my first choice as a source of AHA. But working on the yard was refreshing, satisfying and even fun! And now that I've started, I'm excited to continue cultivating and finessing this project. And there are other projects around the house that will come, too. Manual labor is still not my #1 favorite thing to do (yet), but it's slowly moving up my AHA list.
Last year, we decided we wanted to do a sort of makeover of the back yard. We had a friend come over with a backhoe and tear everything up. He pulled out the concrete slabs with the pipes in them that were clotheslines anchors, and turned over the entire yard. However, for a variety of reasons, we never got around to finishing the project. The concrete and pipes sat at the end of our driveway. The ground remained "bumpy" (to say the least) and the weeds moved in and took over. Mowing the lawn was an ordeal, because we don't own a mower, and with the "bumpy" condition of the ground, it was difficult to maneuver a mower anyway.
I finally got sick of looking at the jungle in the back. There were Queen Ann's lace that were taller than me. It was getting difficult to see the house in the back of us. It was pretty pathetic. Our dear friend borrowed his sister's DR Trimmer (this thing ROCKS, by the way), loaded up his van with all sorts of tools and equipment and came over at 8am. He got right to work "trimming" through the vegetation, while my husband and I helped clear out some of the junk around the edges. We chopped down a couple of small trees, cut down random seedlings that were growing in the patio cracks, and raked, bagged and dragged all of the cuttings to the front curb. A total of about 10 yard bags are filled, and waiting to be taken away. We then covered the entire yard with tarps, and sprayed Round-up around the edges of the house and on anything that was left exposed. Kill it off and start over- that's the plan! The concrete was loaded into our friend's van to be taken to the dump. In a little less than 4 hours, we finished part 1 of the transformation. How wonderful!
I'm not big on physical labor. I'm not an extremely strong person (muscle-wise), and I'm not very big. I can be a little lazy, and I'm a procrastinator. All these reasons contributed to my avoidance of finishing what was started last summer with a backhoe. However, with all that said, once I start doing physical work, I usually work hard and enjoy it. I like working with my hands and seeing progress being made. I like learning how to do new things and being able to do things for myself. I enjoy the feeling of accomplishment knowing that I completed something.
I'm excited to plan what to do next with the yard. The purchase of a storage shed is in the near future, I'm going to start a compost pile, and I'm consulting with my gardening friends as to what plants to use to decorate. The kids want some berry bushes and/or a vegetable garden. And we have to have sunflowers! I'm aiming to have this project finished (or at least mostly finished) in a month or two so we can actually enjoy a new back yard before the snow flies. And I'm looking forward to having a use-able yard that the kids can play in and we can all enjoy.
I can honestly say that manual labor would not have been my first choice as a source of AHA. But working on the yard was refreshing, satisfying and even fun! And now that I've started, I'm excited to continue cultivating and finessing this project. And there are other projects around the house that will come, too. Manual labor is still not my #1 favorite thing to do (yet), but it's slowly moving up my AHA list.
Sounds beautiful! Can't wait to see photos of your gardens. I think I feel the same way about physical labor, but really love the accomplishments when I finally dig in and get my hands dirty and back sore.
ReplyDeleteThis morning you inspired me to finally dig out some tiger lilly's that were completely overgrown and plant the Moonbeam coreopsis & black eyed susan's that have been sitting behind the garage all summer. I got the kids I babysit involved in the digging and watering and they had a great time. I'm so glad its done!