Posted on by Emily

Day 174

Despite a beautiful week of weather, it seems there was no progress on the property.  Still waiting for an explanation of this.  Hoping everyone is OK.

Josh and I spent several hours on-site yesterday doing very fascinating things.

First, we flagged the driveway.

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Josh was measuring and placing the flags as I called out the measurements to him from his plan.  If you squint really hard, you can see the orange flags.

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I’m so glad he knows how to do these things.  I just told him I’d like 1) the driveway to curve around for a pretty approach to the house, 2) a place for people to park out front, and 3) a loop so it’s easy for people to get in and out without a 75 point turn (a challenge we have at our current house).  He takes this information and produces a lovely plan to make all of my driveway dreams come true.  I think I’ll keep him.

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This is his “Why are you taking my picture?” face.

Because I’m so glad you’re my husband and a landscape architect!

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It’s still hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that we are building a house, which will sit between these two piles of dirt in the near future.  Hopefully, this time next year we will be living in it and we’ll be able to have people over and give them hugs without fear.

In the meantime, we’re enjoying improving the property so it is beautiful for us and our future guests to enjoy.

Our second activity was cleaning up this hot mess:

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Among this tangle of vines and trees are two dogwoods, a black cherry, and a cedar tree.  You wouldn’t know it except for the dogwood blooms.

Josh quickly got to work on this with his chainsaw. And before long, it looked like this:

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Much better!

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Josh hauling off all of the brush to the woods.  His truck looking like a Chia Pet.

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While Josh did the heavy lifting, I reviewed the trail camera footage.

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Not much action in the last few days except for Tom desperately searching for Jenny.  I think she may have moved to a different block…

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Sorry, Tom.

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Well, if my boots are any indication, I would call that a successful trip to the property.

Posted on by Emily

Day 161

I’m starting to think we actually live in Portland, Oregon, not Nashville, Tennessee, with the number of rainy days we’ve had the last few months.

This weekend, however, we’ve had two lovely, dry, and mostly sunny days.  Let’s hope this trend continues into next week and for the next few months so they can grade the spot for the house, pour the basement, and frame the house without further delay (ha!).  Word is that the earthwork guy is showing up rain or shine this week.  We shall see…

 

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I have many pictures that look like this.  I’m looking forward to having pictures from this angle that have a house in them.

Back to the nice weather this weekend.  Friends of ours that live very near our current house were taking out some landscaping that had become too much to manage.  They generously offered us some boxwoods and azaleas so we went over to help dig them up and then headed out to the property.

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We planted them in the two front property corners so they would be out of the way during construction.  Once the house is complete, it is likely we will transplant them to the landscaping beds, but for now they are anchoring the front of the property.

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The landscape architect, carefully placing the shrubs while I document from a safe distance.

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Though it appears they are practicing proper social distancing, the reason for their spacing has more to do with ease of mowing than a health risk.

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Aren’t they cute?!

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Here’s how they look from the future front porch.  Josh had to limb up the tree a little bit more so construction vehicles can maneuver.

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My phone camera is not doing this justice at all, and the orange septic field fencing really isn’t helping, but this is one of many beautiful “volunteer” dogwoods along the edge of the property.

This past Christmas, we asked for contributions to our landscaping fund along with the gift giver’s favorite tree, shrub, or plant.  Now that the weather has turned a corner, we are excited to start planning for more planting around the property!