It’s that time of year again, when writing blog posts about projects takes a back seat to the actual projects. Spring sprang in early March, more than a month ahead of schedule in Virginia, and with it came an onslaught of seasonal tasks that usually start ramping up in late April. So every nonoffice moment has been spent outdoors, primarily in pursuit of my spring goal, which is to tidy up the messes and impediments to mowing around the property. So in the past month I’ve:

Bushogged the front field.

This field hadn’t been cut in more than a year, and I was sick of the straggly grass and generous deer habitat uncomfortably close to the house. So much nicer now!

Seeded the worst bare patches with grass.

The worst part about mowing, which I otherwise enjoy, is going over bare patches. If it’s dry, the mower kick up so much dirt that I am blowing red boogers for days.

It took me six hours on a Saturday to seed all these spots, but if I can get grass to grow, mowing will be much more enjoyable.

Disappeared the dirt mountain behind the chicken coop.

This pile of dirt had been here since building the house. It was the soil excavated when the crawlspace was deepened. I was sick of looking at it and weedwacking around it, so with about six scoops of the tractor bucket the soil was gone and distributed around the fields, where I shoveled it into low spots. And I got a sweet new tractor parking spot out of the deal!

Got rid of the azalea pit.

This was where I had stored the big old azaleas removed from around the foundation of the house I tore down. But I’ve finally accepted that I don’t even like azaleas, and I was tired of mowing around this mess in the middle of the field. A few minutes of backhoe action and they’ve gone to a new home, a ditch out of sight in the woods.

Up next…the landscraping continues…