Friday Favorite Five

Time for another Friday Favorite Five which is hosted weekly by Susanne at Living to Tell the Story.

For the past two weeks our yard has undergone some MAJOR transformations. This past Spring some of our very tall fir trees started to topple in our yard, some nearly missing our house. So we decided to have them all taken down and then we'd replant. Step One was having over a dozen trees felled. It's kinda sad seeing them go and it's made the yard look so very different. But I'm very grateful for the following:

1. No one was hurt in the felling of trees. It's kinda scary when you see gigantic trees crashing to the ground. Branches missed faces and tree trunks missed trucks. Everyone is safe.

You can see some of the trees of the trees (the middle sections of them anyway!) that we took down in the following picture. You can also see one of the cherry trees in the "thicket."




2. Dragging logs out of our "thicket" area created a very cool path which we decided to make official. So we cleared out the weeds, blackberry bushes and several wild rhododendrons and are laying out bark dust in order to have an official trail.

3. We're kinda-not-really-at-all yard people. We have done more exploring of our yard this year more than any other and in doing so we discovered about six cherry trees - with cherries on them! (I'm putting a picture here to see if anyone else can identify them. We haven't been able to yet. They have firm skins, are very sweet, but on the small side. They aren't tart like I understand "pie cherries" to be. They seem like they could be more mature in the future now that we know the trees are there and can care for them.



All that to say - this past week we discovered three ADDITIONAL trees, giving us about 9-10 altogether. A mini orchard! It's so awesome!

4. Once I cut back the new growth on the blackberry bushes, I discovered a healthy stock of growing berries. Now exposed to the sun, we're getting a nice little crop for our breakfasts in the morning.

5. Forest Stew. With a more friendly yard (minus blackberries & poison oak) the kids are outside playing more. I picked up some cooking utensils at Goodwill for $0.99 a piece (i.e., a few pots, pans, hand mixers and funny looking tools that baffle even me!) and the kids have been making "forest stew." (They feed it to the gnomes & fairies. Oh yes! I love it!) It's so fun to watch them having fun outside. It's so fun to be taking dominion over the land.

Feeling blessed and just a wee bit sore this week. =)

See ya next week!

Blessings,

Carrie