Workyard expansion

Never thought I would say this but we started expanding the work yard today. Going inwards on each side of the road about 30-40 ft. For now it will be a place to put flitches and rejects off the mill. Afterwards it’ll be space for a couple 10×20 sheds. Its a sloped hill, so dirt removed from the left side will be used to fill in the right side.

Thought it would be fun to look back at where we started. Take a walk down memory lane, if you will. We have been living here for 11 years. Here is a picture of when we were building the garage, before the house was built. Note the small trees.

Here is how things stood for the first few years, until Jim decided he wanted to be able to drive around the back of the garage.

Before land clearing

We had to deal with ditching, then the land clearing could begin.

One down, a few more to go

Jim did as much as he could using the skidsteer. Hours and hours were spent, in evenings and on weekends, moving dirt. Our land is mostly one big hill, so digging into the hill meant moving a lot of dirt and stumps.

Once we hit rock, we called in the big guns. It took the excavator operator more than 12 hours to finish digging into the hill.

We were left with the current work yard. I remember thinking at the time that maybe it was too big. Ha…never.

So back to the expansion…once we had a nice bit cut, Jim brought over the chipper with the skidsteer.

And we got to work.

We did manage to get it plugged once, mainly because there were so many spruce needles and small bits. When that happens, Jim has to remove a few bolts, swing the shoot down, and get it cleaned out.

Here is where we left off.

We want to leave some trees between our current workspace and the expansion. With the weather starting to get colder, we still hope to get both sides of the road cleared and maybe even levelled out before the snow comes. I hope thats not to unrealistic. If it is, we will pick it up again in the spring.

Later