I took the past week off from work to, well, work.  I spent five full days overhauling our back and front yards, a total of about 1900 square feet.  I started by screening 8 yards of rock-filled sub-soil that was left over from the patio installation.  Since Casey loved the way the pile looked as it sat adjacent to the patio for 3 months I was in no rush to move it.  When I finally convinced her to allow me to move the pile, it took me about 14 hours to shovel it and screen the dirt for rocks through a 15/16″ screen.  My next task was to till the soil and remove the debris.  I wasted a half day using a neighbor’s tiller that was older than me and was only saved the next day when another neighbor lent me his tiller that blew through the entire yard in 25 minutes.  Once complete, I moved 6 yards of 50/50 compost/loam (curiously pronounced “loom” here in New England) into the yard.  After leveling and rolling I planted a seed mixture of bluegrass, ryegrass, and fescue.  The most frustrating part of the project came at the end when I turned on the spigot to run my sprinkler “system” (a series of hose and four sprinklers) and nothing happened.  It turns out I don’t have enough water pressure to run one sprinkler let alone four.  So, I have to water by hand twice each day.  Such is life.

Today we woke up to a downpour.  I’m praying that the rivers of run off water didn’t carry away too much seed.  I had about 25 lawn bags full of sod/dirt/waste that I intentionally stored in the garage until today, trash pick up day.  Each bag probably weighed 50-75 pounds so if they got wet the bottoms would tear right out and I’d have a huge mess.  I moved the bags down to the end of the driveway (in the pouring rain) minutes before the collectors came.  They picked up one bag and, after deciding it was too much work, drove away.  I chased them down the road and asked why they gave up.  They told me that the bags weren’t meant for dirt (I told them it was sod) but that if they contained dirt they’d pick them up even though they weren’t “supposed to” (but not in the rain, apparently).  Despite my pleading they would not agree to take the bags.  It was only when I told them that I myself would throw the bags in the truck if they sat there for 90 seconds.  To this they agreed.  Gotta love the DPW.  Anyway, here are two pictures of the new “lawn”, pre-rain storm.

Casey started a new job this week, doing speech therapy in a local middle school on  Monday and Wednesday and in the high school on Friday.  She is super excited to get back to work on a part-time basis.  Consequently, Claire started day care this week.  So far, she loves going to “school”.  The center we chose is very close, has great facilities, and was recommended by our neighbors.  It’s not cheap, but the peace of mind that comes with knowing your kid is safe and in competent hands is certainly worth the extra coin.  After two days, Claire has two friends (Emma and Hayden) and one “owie” (over her eye, from running into the cabinet).  We think that the timing of day care is perfect, because to be honest, Claire is starting to rule the house.  She’s getting a bit bored at home and beginning to act very entitled to things like TV (Mickey Mouse and Elmo’s World), fishy crackers, and literally everything else (her favorite expression is, “that’s my ____”, insert any thing you can think of).

I’m working on transferring videos to the computer, but until then, here are some pictures from the last 8 weeks or so.

Strawberry picking in July

Claire in our neighbor’s pool

Gordon family visits

Claire “nakey” in her chair