A New Project!

We’ve been desperately needing to clear out some overgrowth of vines and brush in our woods. For the first few years that we lived on this property, there was enough cleared ground area for playing and picnicking. We even had an area right by the creek for our tent, Adirondack chairs, and a firepit. But over the years, the usable space has shrunk due to the overgrowth. We have plans to reestablish the area this spring and even add some fun new features, so my husband hired someone with all the necessary heavy-duty equipment to come out and clear the mess while leaving our trees.

The guy was scheduled to start work at 7:00 yesterday morning and all week our son had been anxiously awaiting the arrival of TRACTORS!

I let him have the morning off school since this would be plenty educational. I’ve never wanted to stick too rigidly to our school schedule that we ended up missing teachable moments in other ways, so he was allowed to watch no closer than our fence area and enjoy the tractor show. He even rigged up his own viewing platform with a stadium seat!

He had been so eager to get out and watch that he skipped breakfast. When I went out to check on him later, he said, “I’m so hungry, but there’s no way I’m missing this!” So, I asked him if he’d like for me to bring him a breakfast box, and he excitedly replied, “Oh, yes!” I didn’t even know what a breakfast box was or why that suddenly came out of my mouth, but now I needed to make one, lol! So, I made his favorite breakfast sandwich and put it in a box container. It was still a bit chilly out, so I also made him some hot chocolate and wrote a Bible verse on the cup.

This boy was so excited over his breakfast box, thanking me over and over. Then he read the Bible verse and exclaimed, “Oh, I get it! Because we’re getting our paths cleared today!” And we briefly talked about how God clears all our lifelong paths when trust in Him, just like the excavator was clearing a path in our woods. I left him eating his breakfast and when I was about halfway across the yard he called out, “Thanks again for the Bible verse, Mom!” I was telling my husband about it last night and we were both so touched and thankful that he appreciates when we encourage him with scripture.

After a few hours the tractor mulcher and excavator were making their way back to their trailer at the street and heading out. We took a few minutes before getting back to our regular school routine to play around the cleared area which smelled of freshly cut good wood, mmmm. Love that smell!

I’m so pleased with how it turned out. It feels like we’re getting our whole acre now! We still have all the trees but without the brush, vines, stumps, and mess that we couldn’t walk through the last couple of years. And hopefully this will help us be able to better see where our feet are going this spring and summer should Mr. No-Shoulders rear his ugly head. And he will—ugh!

So now we have a blank slate and we’re eager to get to work on our projects. In addition to bringing back our picnicking and camping area, there are plans to build a fort and zipline! Stay tuned!