The Lower Yard

 We have a small backyard and then a bank and then a ton of land. The little bank (until recently) was covered with a brush that we discovered was a Chinese weed and our landlord had said he was considering ripping it out (and then poisoning it so it wouldn't come back). He said we could do what we want. We have now deemed the area at the bottom of the bank our "lower yard". We have fantastical plans for it. The swing set is going down there (yes, we moved with our giant play structure) and a garden for me and maybe a little camping area for the summer with a bon fire pit and what not. Because there will most likely be a garden down there we opted to rip out the brush (by "we", I mean Rand) ourselves and NOT add RoundUp to the hill that would run downward directly into our vegetables. I can buy toxic veggies at the store, thank you very much. :) I'm not sure what it is with us and giant yard projects, but apparently we like them. And Rand just gets out there and starts working.....even in the winter. I think the thought was, "Let's clean this up before stuff starts growing and getting totally out of control." Instead what we are dealing with is very wet and heavy debris. But it's mostly all cleaned up now. And the best part is that our landlords (neighbors) are very helpful and are taking care of the piles for us and brought down his mower and mowed the whole cleaned up area for us. Score! We are really having fun here...even though it's winter. And I can't even wait for spring to see how everything will transform and bloom and come to color. It's going to be so fun to watch.

So here is the beginning of the "work" we do when we aren't "working".

before

after

the "lower yard". see the potential??