Wednesday, June 30, 2010

A Mighty Fine Day--June 29, 2010

DSC00118

DSC00135

DSC00128

DSC00133

Woke up at 8:00 A.M.  A good night's sleep.  I didn't have any breakfast food, so I threw on some clothes and headed to Wal-Mart.  I bought 7 boxes of cereal, a gallon of milk, and a garden rake.  I ate a bowl of cereal, took a shower, then headed out the door to start working!

I attacked the front yard again.  Basically, I was focusing on getting the rocks out of the dirt.  AGAIN.  It's a slow process, but it's working great.  If only that right side would dry up some!!!  I also attacked the previous bush that was in the ground.  But it was a tough one.  I was not making much progress at all, just slowly digging the dirt (mud) from around the roots.  Then Jobu called me.  He said he had some free time and wanted to know what I was doing.  I told him I was working!  And he said he would join...and bring some tools from the ranch!!!  Including a chainsaw!  PERFECT!

So with renewed vigor, I went at the bush yet again.  I cleared it up quite well, anticipating my brother's arrival.  He arrived with the goods, and we went at it.  I tell you, having the right tools is just perfect.  I zipped through the roots, then started at the base of the trunk.  I would cut, he would rake out.  Dont' get me wrong, it was still work, but there is just something about having two people work at the same time.  The project literally flew by.  We had that bush out of there in no time at all.  And it looked great!!!  It was well below the surface, and it was deep enough that another bush could be planted there no problem.  Perfect!  We even took time to take out a small (very ugly) bush that we had tried to salvage a month ago.  It had life on some small stems, but the majority of it was dead.  So I just took it out completely.  Easier that way.  It was just ugly anyway.

I now had a large hole to fill, though, from the previous bush, so we headed out to the horse ranch to return the tools and pick up a truckload of compost.  What had taken Dad and me 45 minutes to put into the back of my truck last week from shoveling only took two minutes with a front-end loaded on a Kubota.  It's ALL about having the right tools!!!  We came back, and Jobu had to go get ready for work, but I kept on at this project.  I filled in the big hole, grabbed a quick lunch, then tilled up the area.  And I kept sifting the rocks out.

Basically, I worked from 9:00 until 5:00-ish!  It was a good day's work.  But I made progress today!!!  The first time in too long!!!  I could literally wrap this up tomorrow, but I think it will be Thursday before it's complete.  I'm waiting for it to dry a bit more by tomorrow, then I'll sift out the remaining rocks.  From there, I'll be ready to lay down the weed barrier, and then I'm ready to plant some bushes!!!  Then the project is complete!!!  And this has been a HUGE project!  I have spent countless hours (and numerous days) getting this area all cleared out!  I am so excited for it to be done!!!

 

Towards the end of the day, I took a little time to check out a lawn mower from the ranch.  It runs but needs the gear-drive fixed.  Basically, it just needs a good tune-up.  It wouldn't even turn at first because the grass was so caked underneath.  I cleared that out, and it ran fine.  But the self-propel function doesn't work.  But it was going to be too much work before the evening, and I already had plans.

So I took a shower at 6:00 and headed to D'Arcy's Pint to meet Todd, a best friend from high school whom I've only seen a handful of times in the past 10 years.  It was good to hang with him.  We spent the entire evening together, eating horseshoes, and then going out to hang with his dad and some friends at a bar.

I was back in by 10:30.  I want to get good sleep for tomorrow!!!  I have a ton of work to do and only a little time to do it in!!!  I have another friend coming into town tomorrow!!!  And she needs picked up from the train station at 12:50!!!  So basically, my plan is to get the entire area sifted of rocks, then tilled, then raked to form a nice sloping surface away from the house.  Then Thursday I can put the weed barrier down and plant the bushes and be done!!!

I'm excited!

A VERY productive day today.  A lot of work completed.

Ended up in bed at 11:45. P.M.  Alarm is set for 8:00 A.M.

No comments:

Post a Comment