Brush and Bulky

Twice a year our garbage service has "brush and bulky" days where we can put out as much as we want (on other pick up days during the year, everything needs to be contained within your one bin). So this is the time of year when all the neighbors are out trimming their yard, even if it's 100 degrees outside. Ryan was (conveniently) out of town for the entire week leading up to brush and bulky pick-up. So that meant I was in charge of doing all the trimmings around here. I am pretty sure that neighbors who did not know that Ryan as out of town may have been thinking he was a schmuck (but he's not) for having his 6.5 month pregnant wife out there in the heat cutting down a tree by herself with a handsaw. Yes, that is right, I cut down a tree with a handsaw!! It may have taken me 3 different mornings of waking up early to do so, but I did it! And, of course I forgot to take a "before" picture, but based on all of the branches you'll see on our curb, you can get the idea that this was a pretty big undertaking (remember: 100 degrees + 6.5 months pregnant :). I'm not normally a fan of cutting down trees, but this tree was infested with those caterpillar worms that eat away at the tree. I cut it down to being about 3' high with hopes that it will grow back again someday.

This is just outside our "front" door (for whatever reason the front door is actually on the side of our house, so it feels weird to call it the front door)...there were a lot of dead vines that I trimmed back...again, no "before" shot.

And perhaps the best part about brush and bulky is that a skid steer drives down the street and picks everything up and dumps it into the back of the garbage truck. For those of you with little ones, you know that this is big time in the world of entertaining toddlers. And, even more exciting, we were doing FaceTime (a.k.a. skype / ichat) with Owen and Stephanie at the time, so Owen also got to watch via the computer being pointed out the window! :)