Playing in the Park

 The construction workers dropped off several piles of gravel in the park. It was too much for the kids. They all ran out to climb around on the piles of gravel.

a new road

Looks like we are going to get a new road out front. 

They are almost done with all the heavy equipment in the park. They are just doing landscaping now. 

 See that orange fence? Yeah, we still have a hole in our yard from when they tunneled the electric lines. I think my shrubs are dead now. 

It will be nice when this is all done and things can be quiet again. The last few weeks were hard. They had a steamroller to smooth out the road into the park. It shook the whole house. I couldn't stand the constant vibration and had to find an excuse to go out.

Park holes, playground, and frog

We walked around to check out the progress in the park. Emma found these huge holes and jumped right in! This is where they a building a picnic pavilion. 

Construction keeps moving along. The construction company has agreed with the town to only work Mon-Fri 7:00 am to 5:00 pm. That way the weekends are quiet. It's fine when school is in because we are all up before 7:00 am. However, construction on this park started right when school got out for the summer. That was a bit of a challenge for us. I have been lucky to sleep in until 7:30 before I am awoken by the noise. I'm glad that school is back in so I am not woken up by the work.

The playground equipment got delivered and they have been slowly putting it together. The company who made the playground equipment sent their own guys to assemble the playground. They did not know about the agreed upon work hours. They started before 6 am on Sat and Sun.  

 A few days later I woke up to this in my yard. They are tunneling under our driveway to run a power line from the box in our yard over to the picnic pavilion. They pulled out a few of my shrubs.  

 That night we found this toad on our driveway as we were pulling in. Thankfully, we did not run over him. He hopped off into the grass in time. He was about the size of my fist. 

Rocks for the park

We got this huge delivery of rocks this morning. It's all for the park. 

Right in front of our house.

Construction problems

Construction continues on the park. They brought in a big dump truck really early this morning. Soon after they started digging a trench at the end of the road. They dug and dug until they cut our Fios line, despite the fact that we pointed out where our line was several times. We were without phone, internet, and TV for 3 days. They called Verizon and a guy finally came out and connected a line from across the street, over the lawn, and to our house. It was a temporary fix. A little nerve racking to watch these big construction vehicles drive over this loose wire that ran across the street. It took them another two weeks to bury the line in a conduit. 

  A few days later they brought in tons of gravel to fill in where the road is going to be extended.  

visitors

With all the commotion in the woods we are getting all kinds of crazy things around our house. Just a couple days ago a yellow-billed cuckoo came crashing into our sliding glass door. Sadly, he did not recover. 

Additionally, our front porch has welcomed many bugs looking for a new home. Emma was heading outside to ride her bike and this guy waiting for her. She called me in for help. I told her it was a harmless beetle and to just jump over it or walk around it. It is a female eastern Hercules Beetle, one of the largest beetles in Virginia. 

The scenery is changing

First, one of our trees got damaged in a storm about a year ago. It had a large split running down it's trunk. It still stood tall, but was slowing starting to lean into the woods. We could tell by the angle that it would not hit our house nor our neighbors house. Today, a few day after a storm I heard some crackling. I called for the girls and we all ran onto the deck and watched this tree come down. We will need to get a tree trimmer to come and take it down the rest of the way.

 Meantime, they have started to work on the park. First, they came in and cleared out the underbrush. Now they are taking out all the trees. It is amazing to watch. They just seem to tap the tree with their backhoe and the whole tree comes falling down. Then they grab it, shake off all the dirt and move it to a pile for logging. 

It breaks my heart. I love gazing out on these woods.

Here's a couple days later:

New park coming

Today was the ground breaking on the new park going in right next to our house. And I mean RIGHT next to us. We are the very last house on the street. It is not a cul-de-sac, just a dead end street with a barrier blocking the end of the road. 

This got dropped off a couple days ago.

 Time for the ground breaking ceremony. They actually brought in a pile of dirt for the VIPs to stick their shovels in. Notice how think the trees are behind the barrier. They are all going to be taken down... :(

 Here's the plans to the park. Now the construction will officially begin.