My backyard

When we first bought this house, the backyard was a scary place, especially if you were trying to mow what little grass and weeds would grow under these two ginormous Elm trees.  My biggest complaint is that they shed . . . branches and sticks and leaves . . . ALL the time, especially when the wind blew!  But the real reason we had them cut down back in 2008 was because they were getting old and teetering dangerously above our house.  That was a great day, and somehow the backyard seemed so much bigger!  Still, we were left with two giant stumps and bumpy, uneven ground . . . still hard to mow.  So finally I said, "these stumps have got to go!"  Kenny brought the backhoe and started in on them.

This stump still grew branches like crazy, and we called it the burning bush

I have to say, I was a little surprised how big of a hole Kenny had to dig to get that thing out!  It looked big from the top, but underneath it was huge!  After a couple hours, it finally broke loose.

Pulling out the stump

And that is the bottom - check out the size of that thing!

 And while dad was pulling out the stump . . . the kids and I enjoyed the swingset.

Stetson

Lucy

Lydia on the slide

The next day Kenny started in on the second stump . . . and after about six hours he had pretty much dug up the entire backyard, and the stump was still there!  Six more hours, and he got to this point:

Look how many roots that tree had!!!

 It looked like this for quite awhile, and I wondered what Kenny was doing.  It's a good thing he is patient, I would have just given up!  He FINALLY persevered the stump came loose.  Yay!!!

The ginormous stump and a few of it's roots

And now we are left with . . . a really big mess!!!  I had no idea there were so many roots under there, no wonder the ground was so bumpy!  As I always say, it has to get worse before it gets better, and we are on our way to a better backyard!!!