slated

Why the brightly colored ties on the trees, you ask? Well, it's because in a couple of days, these trees, along with many of their brothers, will not be standing here.

Yes, yes, I know; a standing tree is a happy tree. But consider this:
And this:
and this.
Pine beetles are awful around here. And it's a bad idea to have dead, ailing or vulnerable trees around your house or power lines. I will miss them, but they do need to go.

And then there's this problem:
Our whole back yard looks pretty much like this. It's one big slope, good ol' Alabama red clay, and between the washing out and the pottery-like nature of the soil, we have very little grass. Thankfully, some very capable and generous guys from our church have decided that two years is long enough to go without grass, so they are coming to help us with some MAJOR yard work. We'll be taking out the pines and terracing the yard so it won't wash so badly. We'll have a tractor and backhoe out here this weekend, and a lot of very nice guys.

While I'm at it, I think I'll move the garden closer to the berry bushes. They're just far enough apart that I usually don't get around to checking it all. That is, when there's anything to check, which there's not right now.

And then there's this. We call it "the pile." It's trees that were pushed down to make room to build the house. We will be pulling out any useable logs, cutting them to manageable lengths, and stacking them neatly someplace else. Then we'll have to burn the rest. Someone suggested we roast hot dogs as it burns - I'm wondering if we can get that close... it's a huge pile.