Clearing brush

Last weekend Aaron, Arden, Keith and I transformed the animal loading dock from this:





to this:





(Notice the groundhog hole that was nicely camouflaged under all that brush. It's part of a network that includes the inside of the tractor shed.)

This area isn't done yet, but I think you can get a sense of the hidden treasure that was waiting to be revealed.

The hen house is awaiting a similar cleanup:




Speaking of the hen house (and the outhouse, for that matter),


I think we'll forgo the scraping and sanding and repainting every few years and just replace the siding with Hardie board.

We have lots of old doors in the barn with which to replace this one.


As I said before, the Anderson windows from the side porch will be used in place of these rotted ones.


John said he'll save the studs from the walls that are being removed in the house so we can use them to frame the windows and retain the rustic look it has now.



The hen house is quite charming and is actually in pretty good condition. It's rather large, has big windows and a concrete floor, and one entire wall is stone.




In the future we'll have goats to help clear brush, because the whole place is overgrown like this, especially along all the fences. No doubt, it will be an ongoing race against the natural forces of plant life to consume every available niche with weeds. But it sure does clean up nice, doesn't it?