wow, a productive day at the farm

Today Mom and Dad came out and we had a really productive day at the farm.  We worked hard and will be stiff and sore but we got several good jobs done.  Ten days ago we had our lumberjack day and part of the results of that cutting and splitting and stacking is a pile of brush that we burn.  This year we rented a chipper/shredder and had hoped to chip the branches and use them for mulch instead of burning them.  It worked fine for shredding the bags of leaves but was just not strong enough to grind through the volume of branches that we have at the end of our weekend.  So, today was the day to burn the brush.  The accumulated brush was in a pile that I am guessing was probably 20 feet long, 10 feet wide and maybe 4 feet high.  We had a pile started where we had once burned before and I had been piling weeds and plant material that I did not want to go into my compost pile there.  The plan was to burn that and once it was hot we would feed the brush a few branches at a time onto the hot fire. 

Getting the fire started and hot was a challenge.  The last couple days have been cloudy and damp/rainy.  Even with Dad's 'encouragement' the fire struggled to get going and just when we were thinking that we were going to have to give up and try another day it decided to cooperate. 

While Dad encouraged the fire with various combustibles , Mom and I worked on pulling some nails from Caitlin and Robb's reclaimed lumber.  We had a nice little pile of nail free boards by the time we could begin dragging the brush to the fire.

We also worked on some landscaping around the house.  We decided while we were painting to pull out the old plant material from the front of the house, add some dirt to improve the grade away from the house and then put down plastic and a border and add some wood bark.  I am so pleased that we were able to get the smaller west side done and ready for bark.  

There are no before pictures but here are a few 'afters'.

8 or 10 nail free boards

The fire, winding down. 

Between the tree on the right and the white door there used to be a big pile of brush.

Ready for wood bark.

 I am tired but it is a good tired.  Thanks Mom and Dad for all the help today.