What the Heck?

Our last house was surrounded by trees. Great big deciduous trees. Trees that dropped all of their leaves every autumn. And all of those leaves needed to be raked and bagged. By me. And Tony. But mostly me.

Imagine my joy when we purchased a home that had coniferous trees. No leaves to rake or bag. I was giddy just thinking about all of the time that I would have this fall now that we owned a home with evergreens!

I just love that word. Evergreen. Break it down: Ever Green. As in NEVER orange or yellow or red or brown. And  never shedding leaves that needed raking. Or Bagging.

Or so I thought.

Much to my horror, Autumn arrived and my beautiful conifers started dropping needles. Lots and lots of needles. Acidic needles that will kill the grass if they are not.…RAKED and BAGGED!

What the heck is up with that? Don’t they understand the concept of EVER GREEN?

I was almost ready to put our new house back on the market, but then I found this:Children who actually thought it was fun to rake and bag. Children who were thrilled at the prospect of doing this oh-so-tedious chore. Heck three out of four of them weren’t even my kids but they willingly raked their ever-lovin’ hearts out and then thanked me for the opportunity!

All they asked for in return was to be able to do this:

And this:Small price to pay  to have someone else do the raking. And bagging. Next year maybe I can even talk them into carrying the bags to the curb. Hmmmm.

Yep, life is good at our new home.