We have a partial driveway, folks!

Josh could tell from here that it had not been graded per the plan.   More on that in a minute.

As we drove in on the easement, we could see a bunch of new rock on the easement itself.  Evidently the developer we purchased the land from did not build up the easement road properly so one of the dump trucks delivering gravel sank into it earlier this week.  Oops! Thankfully, our contractor was able to repair the road and keep things moving through the week.

Hey, guess what?

This is our driveway.  Nifty, eh?

We had several videos on the trail camera of the driveway coming to life.

See where that dip is between the trees?  Yeah, that’s not supposed to be a dip anymore.  Josh was not pleased.  But, good news: it can be fixed! I keep telling him this.

Back to other progress.  They have gotten the house pad pretty well set.  Next up: digging the footings and the partial basement.

The spot where Josh is standing will be graded down a few feet for the driveway.

Joshua, step away from the heavy machinery.

The first bathroom has been installed.  Ready for guests!

We decided to take a walk around the perimeter of the property to asses the trees.  Though they’re really close together, Josh wanted to keep both of these. One is a sycamore and the other he believes is a birch.

We stumbled upon an ephemeral stream.  I just learned this term from Josh yesterday.

Since we’ve started this process, “ephemeral stream”, “cubic yards of dirt”, and “earthwork guy” have been part of my vocabulary.

Boy, does having a partial driveway make this feel more official.

We brought this sapling from our current house.  It was growing in the landscaping right up against our back porch.  Josh thinks it came from one of the gigantic oak trees we have in our yard.

We planted it in one of the back corners of the new property.  Hopefully it survives and thrives and becomes an eighty foot tall tree in the next fifty years.  We named him Craig since that’s part of our current street name.

We didn’t want Craig to be lonely, so we searched in our woods to find a few more saplings to plant in the other back corner.

This one is a beech tree.  There were several others that were slightly bigger, but Josh was concerned that they had already developed “a habit” and wouldn’t transplant well.  Nobody wants a tree with a bad habit.

My dad loves beech trees so we decided to name this one for him.  Meet Barry.

This is Dora, the dogwood.  I don’t know anyone named Dora except for the explorer.

And this is her sister dogwood, Darla.  Also don’t know any Darlas.

Let’s hope they all make it!

This tree did not make it.

According to our neighbors, much more of our property used to be forest, but a tornado took out a lot of the trees about twelve years back.  Many of the remaining trees in the open space have a narrow span or have no branches except at the top.  They are also really close together, which works in a forest setting, but not so much in an open setting where they will start to crowd each other out and compete for resources.

My husband is rubbing off on me and I am now a tree expert, in case you were wondering how I know all of this fascinating information.

So, Josh decided this tree needed to go because he wants the tree next to it to thrive.

My dad, Barry (beech tree named for him), helped move the sectioned tree so we can use it later for firewood.

It was a red oak and it smelled so good!

OK, just one more thing to end this rambling post:

We’ve hired Tom as security at the front gate.