Timber!!

As many of you know we have a very large yard that had many very large trees. Unfortunately, they were all infected by the Ash Borer. It is a little bug that borers into the tree and thus cuts off the tree's supply of water and nutrients.

We had one tree fall on its own in August. It was completely rotted out. Our neighbors hired a tree service to cut down their 2 trees and wanting ours down too we told them to continue on into our yard. They ended up cutting down 14 trees. It was really amazing to watch them cut down these 50 foot plus trees. There was one massive tree by our house. It was boxed in by power lines on one side and our house on the other. I was really amazed by how they maneuvered the branches down, never touching our house or the lines...that is until they got to the very last cut. I don't know if they were tired or what, but they cut the bottom part of the trunk down and it fell unexpectedly onto the power lines. You should have seen them panic and how they worked frantically to fix the problem. They were able to get it off the lines but not before it caused some damage to the lines.

I am so sad to see the trees go. Our yard looks so bare now, although I must admit fall this year was much more enjoyable (raking up leaves from 14 massive trees is quite the undertaking).

A couple of trees turned out to be rotten in the middle. Here is a picture of one of them.

Here is a picture of one of the guys cutting down the tree. He is on the small branch on the right.

The kids loved playing on the logs. Here is Jordan.

Jordan on her thinking stump.

Caden

Our new bare yard (the trees on the left belong to our neighbors) and a picture of some of the wood left by the trees.

The logs are almost gone now. A friend of a neighbor 2 houses down from us took over half of it, our next door neighbor took a little of it, and some people from our ward are taking the rest. Our poor yard is pretty beat up between the trees falling on it, the logs laying on it, and all of the cars driving onto the grass to get the wood.