A Lovely Sunday

Well Grandma M and Grandpa J came for a visit and to help with some yard work today. We had a few trees that needed to be taken down as phase one of Operation Swing Set. They live about 2 hours away so it was very nice of them to come up with their chainsaw and help us out. Z was very excited to see them and I bought him this so that he would be out of the way of the "tree cutters".

I have to admit that I had my doubts about S and his dad taking down this mighty tree. His mom and I had suggested professional tree cutters but they insisted that they could accomplish the task for free. The tree was leaning towards our back deck and would have to be taken down very carefully so that it would not take anything valuable out on its way down. It was too tall to climb with the ladder they had, so they climbed a tree right next to it and tied a rope to that tree. They then took one of Z's footballs and tied the rope to it. They threw it so that it went around the branches of the big tree (I know this sounds confusing). Long story short, they tied the big tree to the smaller tree and then tied the long rope to the back of their Honda Element. S's mom then drove the car away from the house and the plan was that it would pull the tree away from the house and away from the deck. Hmmmmmmmm.....

They decided to move Z's sandbox away from the line of fire and put it in the middle of our back hill. Once they told me that they were ready, Z and I ran upstairs to our room to watch the show from a safe distance. We sat and watched as S's dad cut the tree with the chainsaw and then his mom drove the tree away from the house......and then, "UH OH". That is what Z said when he saw this very large tree come down and crush his sandbox!!!! Yup, his little Step 2 sandbox from his Grandma N and Chi Chi was lying underneath the giant tree. I was not very happy.

We came downstairs to inspect the damage and the three of them were in fits of laughter. I, not finding too much funny at the moment, asked them what they were laughing at. They pointed to the spot where Z's sandbox had been....the tree had completely cleared it! If they had left it alone, it would all be in one piece. Well after careful inspection, I realized that it looked a lot worse then it was. The box has four "stones" to sit on and one is now cracked, the rest of the box is just fine. We lost a few toys but other than that all is well and our yard is now safer to play in.

So this weekend the lumber comes and then it will be another week before our swing set party :) I'll continue to keep you posted. Thanks Grandma M and Grandpa J for coming to visit!!! It was so nice to spend time with you and you were so very helpful :)