A little fun in the yard

We have suffered a loss in the W household. Are we grieving? That would be a NO! HA! We "lost" two trees in our front yard and couldn't be happier about it.

Here is the before picture:



I think it's safe to say the right tree is dead. Considering this picture was taken in April and it has looked like that since last June. But, in the spirit of trying to re-do the front yard landscape, we might as well rip out the tree on the left as well, right? It is pretty boring, the leaves are so heavy that they shade the whole front yard and we can't grow any grass.

We were going to call a company to come out and take care of business. But that's not fun and it would probably cost a lot more to hire out for such a simple job. One of our neighbors mentioned that Home Depot rented stump grinders. Perfect! We planned on taking a day to put the trees out of their misery.

So, with newly purchased chainsaw in hand, we got to work. The dead tree was incredibly light and easy to remove and break down. Once we were left with the stump, it was time to grind it down under the soil.

Mr. W hard at work

Once the stump was into the ground deep enough, we put down some dirt and filled the hole. We'll deal with the shrubs and lack of grass eventually. We had another tree to work on!

Next we got to work on the "live" tree. Mr. W wanted to make sure it was under city permits before cutting it down, so we worked on pruning it for this day. We bought this little nifty tool at Home Depot and tried to take out some of the weight in the tree for now.

Not too shabby for an afternoon's worth of work

The next day Mr. W came home and announced the tree was under city limits and could be uprooted! So, the following Friday we spent about an hour removing the tree. Of course it was much heavier and required a lot more work.

That Friday was a big day for the W's. We painted the dining room and removed the tree.

Dining Room primed and taped Friday morning:

While we waited for the primer to dry, we went outside and took care of the tree. After it was said and done, it was back inside and painting the dining room! Busy bumble bees!

The only time Auburn/Clemson/UF colors will ever be in our house

And here are the After pictures!

Mr. W still hard at work digging up the roots of the tree.

The dining room with our new chandelier and paint!

And here is Polo enjoying some time on the front porch while we work in the yard! Next we will figure out what to do with the shrubs and overall front yard. Definitely some color (other than green!)