North Side Update

Here's the before...so much ivy

We decided to hire someone to tackle the ivy instead of doing it ourselves. We both agree that this is probably some of the best money we've spent on the house so far. We felt like we got a really fair price, I liked the guys who worked on it a lot, and if we hadn't chosen this route, I have a sneaking suspicion we would still be trying to pull out ivy today. : ) This next photo is after day 1 of 2. The second day they hacked out all those sticks. This all happened a couple weeks back. The great news, we found two trees in all that mess!

On Saturday we started digging for posts. We have some seriously rocky soil so a post hole digger turns out to be pretty worthless. Instead we've been using this awesome tool that my Dad turned us on to. It's basically a 6 foot steel bar that has a point on one end and looks like a large flat head screwdriver on the other. It's super heavy, but does a great job breaking up the soil. One person (Pete - who is strong enough to lift it) uses that, and the other (me) uses a hand trowel and their hands to dig out what's been loosened up and try to make shape of what huge rock is in the way. On Saturday we hit several huge rocks. Bummer. On Sunday, we were not feeling particularly excited to dig the rest of the holes after the difficulty we had on Saturday. Pete said he'd start on the first hole while I ran and picked up more cement and did two other quick errands. By the time I got back he had managed to dig all the rest of the holes!! So encouraging! He said he didn't hit a single large rock like the day before, only lots of little ones.

Here's a shot with all the posts in. Notice the string booby traps we set on the right. I was bummed we didn't catch anyone over night. : ) (String was used to hold plants out of the way, but it did remind me of the ones Greg Hoffman and I used to set as kids. Poor Kristie : )

We also worked Monday night (yes, our anniversary, don't worry though, we still had time to have a nice dinner together, Pete had gotten off early because he's super motivated to get this thing done : ). All the cross pieces are up now and ready for pickets. I need to go start sealing now and see how many I can get ready for him tonight while I'm at dance.

It's starting to look like we're going to have a great backyard! Can't you just imagine a hammock strung between those two shade trees. I can't wait!