Homework, Part 1

Since we don't have nearly enough stuff keeping us busy lately, we've decided to do some major work on our yard this summer. This is our third summer living in our house, and it's definitely way past time for us to put our mark on the yard.

We decided to do one of the biggest jobs first; taking out a couple of trees and trimming branches on a couple of others. There is a huge honey locust right behind our house that was fine, and healthy, but that also has tiny leaves that build up in our gutters, clogging them and causing water to pour over the gutters and into our basement on more than one occasion. You know, not one of our favorite occurrences.

I guess I should have said, there WAS a huge honey locust right behind our house, because it's no longer there. They were there and done by noon today when Aaron stopped home for lunch. The difference is amazing, no?



We also had some branches trimmed on the tree that's just off to the right in the photo, and a diseased oak taken out in front so that the blight in that tree didn't spread to the two other oaks we have in our yard, and one branch that was brushing our house taken off the maple on the side of our house.

We'll miss out on some shade, but I like a house that feels light and airy, and I think we'll definitely have even more of that feeling now.

Still on our list of yard to-dos (and I doubt we'll get them all done this summer, but that won't be for lack of trying):

(Here's an old picture of the front of our house for reference:

)

• Tear out all of the overgrown bushes in the front yard (and the decorative tree that is even more overgrown and blocks our porch).
• Trim down the lilac bush so we can see out our front window.
• Add window boxes along our porch railing, filled with red geraniums
• Add back in some new bushes, grasses, and colorful flowers in front
• Paint the front door
• Put house numbers above the garage
• Replace the lights
• Replace the mailbox
• Clean up the porch, and add a couple of chairs where an old pile of wood, left by the previous owners, currently sits