The New Driveway!

The biggest excitement in March was getting our driveway fixed!  We've known the Bergeron's for years (see link here for Baker's Dozen), and recently Chuck started his own business doing excavating work.  So we decided to have him fix our driveway.  He did a great job!  He worked hard and long hours and did even more that I expected!

It took us almost a whole week to really clean things up around here - my being pregnant last year, the move and then all our adventure with Esther meant we haven't done much outdoor clean up in over a year!

But we got it done in time, and Chuck showed up with a huge bull dozer, an excavator, and Doug Crabtree brough his double trailer semi truck full of pit run, and later made around 10 trips with new gravel as well! Our boys loved watching it all! I love watching it too - knowing how nice it will all look when we are done!

Here's a photo of Chuck working to re-do the front yard

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Solid Rock Excavating"][/caption]

The driveway looks awesome, and he even removed the biggest stump I've ever seen from the middle of our back yard!  He also leveled the back yard, and made our front yard larger.  Here are some before and after photos:

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="End of driveway/parking area - before"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="End of driveway/parking area - after"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Storage Shed Area - Before"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Storage Shed Area - after"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Old Parking Area"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="New Parking Area"][/caption]

We actually had Chuck take out pit run and put in dirt to make the driveway/yard make more visual sense with the new house.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Entrance to the Garage, Before"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Entrance to the Garage, After"][/caption]

This was one of the best improvements - before we couldn't even get into the right bay of the garage due to the "hole" in front of it - pure mud and no traction. It was a serious make-over that is for sure!

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Front of the House Before"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Front of the House Now"][/caption]

We are still working on the front yard (putting in new grass take hard work and lots of time, that's for sure, but I'm a little more than halfway done with the front yard now).

And here's our new grape trellis - we took treated wood from an old swing set who's brackets had weakened, and the wood off an old chicken run and *poof* we have a new trellis!

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="New Grape Trellis - dirt will be lawn soon!"][/caption]

And lastly - here's the flash animation I used to post while we were building our home - and following is the current view!

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="House building Progression"][/caption]

Oh - and if you look carefully, in one photo there's a dump truck dumping sand - that's also Doug Crabtree!

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Current View - note new flower gardens at the bottom of each porch post!"][/caption]

The last photo will be taken when the front yard is all nicely grassed in and the trim has been painted a darker blue than the house - hopefully that will be sometime in July!