...taming the back yard, 1.1

this was taken yesterday...
behind the red cart, is my lime tree...
behind that is an old half-barrel full of dirt...
it came with the house[20 years ago...]

since I couldn't budge it...
I stacked stuff on it and let the leaves swallow it...

so after moving the ferns...
cleaning off the potting bench...
moving the two citrus trees...
digging into the junk on the top of the barrel...
finding 3 fallen wind chimes...
and shoveling a bunch of leaves...



there it sits...
still surrounded by leaves...
all the staves falling off the rusty hoops...

and then...



*POOF*

it's gone...
[oh...if it had only been that easy...]

actually...after removing[OK...they fell off, happy ?...]
half the rotten staves...
I used the one intact hoop to pull it to the edge of the patio...
[NOT easy... I may have hurt myself...]

then...I removed the rest of the staves...
[OK.. picked them up...they fell off...]
and the intact hoop with 1 stave still attached...
and put it into the trash...

I broke up the huge chunk of dry dirt with a shovel...
and scattered it around a rose bush...



I'll be able to smooth things out after I move the empty pots...

then I shoveled leaves until all my leaf containers were full...



and, behold... the oak tree HAS roots...
and there is a concrete patio...
cracked as it may be...
probably from the roots of the oak tree...

there must have been 6 inches of leaves here...
but I've done my bit here for today...
I need to be able to move tomorrow...

the good news...there's gonna be a lot of room back here...

the bad news... it's almost time for the leaves to drop again...

*sigh*