Friday, August 10, 2007

She can walk

Emily showed us this afternoon that she can walk on her own. She walked back and forth between us for about 30 minutes or so.

Here's a movie we took of it: walking

And we've found the tool required to dig in our yard. It's awesome!!!

Saturday, August 04, 2007

May the digging begin

It's official, we're putting in a sprinkler system and sodding the yard.

So, last week we had One-Call come out and show us where all the buried stuff is (who knew we had a phone cable running along the entire south side of our lot. We've got an 8-inch water main running down the middle of the front yard (right where I wanted to put a pipe, that has been moved on the plan. And the gas company isn't exactly sure where our gas line is (their measurements and reality are about 6 feet off - we'll dig carefully).

So once that was done we marked where all of our lines were going to go. Then we found all the places where our lines crossed the buried stuff. For that we're required to hand dig whenever we're within 18 inches of the marked location. Now, for those who haven't dug in Arkansas soil lately, it's basically rock glued together with hard clay, with a scattering of smaller rocks for flavor. It's a blast.

We had Eli break out the big dig, it was cute. Unfortunately the big dig was no match for the rock/clay mix of our yard. It required the use of a pick.


Alicia demonstrates her pick skills. She's quite handy.


We're digging to a depth of 12-inches. Which is just about knee level for Eli. He enjoys measuring the trenches for us.



And of course Emily even got in on the action. She's good at collecting the rocks we extract. We're going to have to bring in a load of dirt just to fill in the trenches.


In the middle of all of this the AT&T repair guy showed up to fix our phone. We've had an awful buzz and crackling in the line for the past week. Turns out our line was corroded at the pedestal, he fixed that it's is better than it's been in months. Eli decided to check out what he was doing.