After we took down the trees we still had to "clear" the land. We fearlessly waded in and began weeding, digging, and raking. The "forest" we took down seemed to have a firmer grip on the ground than we anticipated and I am still having nightmares about all the roots we dug up! We have to a lot of work to put in the lawn, so in the meantime we decided to plant a garden in the freshly tilled dirt patch we had. Dan and I both love gardens and we planted with a vengeance--peas, carrots, green beans, green peppers, corn, cucumbers, potatoes, and several kinds of tomatoes. We also did a little bit of planning and planted two varieties of raspberries and 4 trees--peach, apricot, honeycrisp apple, and a golden delicious apple. We won't have anything from them til next year...
Dan in his attempt to conquer the tangle and maze of roots and vines that had run rampant for the twenty years prior to our occupancy! As you can see in from the pile in the next picture...although the trees were down the roots will take us years to excavate completely.
The grand finale! The kids are posing in front of the "Feldman Family Farm" as our backyard neighbor, Dave, calls it. You also get a great view of our neighbor's garden. She is first generation immigrant from Italy and has mob connections (seriously!)....but her Spaghetti and Meatballs are fabulous!
