We’ve had a bunch of brush piles on our property for the last five years. Home to many birds and critters no doubt. But a couple close to the house had become eye sores so I had the boys from Korte Tree Care come and adios them.
More adventurous types would burn these but the thought of setting our woods on fire is too much for me.
I can assure you, when a tree falls in the forest –with no creatures around — it does not make a sound. A heave wind pushed this guy over last week. Been dead for a long time, providing home for bugs (and birds). I fired up my little chainsaw and cut it into nice, easy-to-lift chunks that will be hauled out later this week.
From the August Smart Locks website: “Ever forget or lose your keys? Wonder if you locked the door on your way out? Or go all the way home just to let someone in? August Smart Locks take any worry out of getting into your home. Use an app on your phone to control your door to unlock/lock, grant guest access, see who came and left, and let anyone in from anywhere. Simply attaches to your existing deadbolt on the inside of your door – your outside lock stays the same and you keep your existing keys.”
Uses a couple of AA (?) butteries that are easy to access and change. You can still use your key and lock the door manually if you need to.
PS: Sorry about the annoying sniffs. Runny nose.
The only thing that can make a room cozier than a couple of Golden Retrievers is a nice wood-burning fireplace. Growing up, the only time I saw one was in an old Frank Capra Christmas movie. Barb grew up with one and her father loved futzing with it. We don’t use ours to heat our home, so we don’t go through a lot of firewood. I sort of like splitting firewood but we’re just a likely to toss one of those little fake logs in.
Our friend Susan always has a Hollywood fire going when we visit on Thanksgiving so this year we bought a load of firewood from her guy.
I think I might be done loading/hauling/stacking firewood for the year. Good exercise, oozing zen… but enough is enough.
After five long years, the last of wood piles are gone. I finally got up the nerve to take the pickup down into the woods… and get her back out. This opens up lots of possibilities. Instead of hauling bags of mulch in a wheelbarrow, I can drive the entire load to where it’s needed. Same for firewood.
Couldn’t have done it without the pickup and, sadly, it did not come through unscathed. You really can’t see how big the dent is in these photos. And, ironically, the good steel in this older trucks makes is more difficult to remove some dents.
UPDATE: The guys at Xtreme Body managed to fix the dent and put the trim back on… all for $120.
During the 30+ years we’ve lived in our home (on 3 acres) we’ve thinned out a lot of trees, mostly scrub cedar. Woodsman that I am, I chainsawed them into logs and stacked them, thinking someone would want them for some purpose. Wrong. They’ve been sitting where I stacked them for years.
Today I started getting rid of them… with the help of Minty Fresh, the family pickup truck. It was always my hope I could drive the truck down into the woods and haul shit out with logs at the top of the list. But having no experience driving off-road in a four-wheel-drive vehicle, I’ve been reluctant to tackle the rough terrain and steep-ish grade. Until today.
I flipped the lock-out hubs to LOCKED… put the low-range gear lever in “granny low” and eased down the hill. I scraped a tree once or twice but the pickup is so beat up you’d never find the spot. I loaded up the extra-long bed with logs and made it back to the road without a hitch (although I do have a hitch).
Aside from my lack of off-road/4WD experience, the big obstacle to this project was nobody wanted the logs. But as (bad) luck would have it, my friend George has some big-ass brush piles as a result of last spring’s tornado… and he offered to let me add my logs to his piles which he will safely burn.
I’ve got maybe half a dozen more truck loads but it’s a labor of love and great exercise. And if I role the pickup… a great blog post. [Photos]
We have a beautiful view from the deck at the rear of our home. Front and center is/was a cedar tree (the one with the bird house) that that started looking pretty gnarly so we called the tree guys to cut it down, along with a few other cedar trees that just weren’t adding to the view.
These guys did some work for us back in January. They’re not cheap but they are really good.
One or both of the dogs sleep on the bed with Barb…unless she’s out of town. Then it’s the couch.