Over the past six and a half years that we’ve lived in this house we’ve managed to cut down all of our trees except one.

This giant maple resided in our front yard. It was beautiful and helped give our street the tree-lined look that everybody loves. However, we had an exterminator out to take care of a carpenter ant problem in the house and he said that they were living in that tree. The past two years I had noticed that the leaves on this tree didn’t seem nearly as big and full as the other maples nearby. Also, it shed a LOT of branches and I always worried that a big one was going to fall during high winds.

It wasn’t healthy, it was tearing up our sidewalk (causing a tripping hazard), and housing stinkin’ carpenter ants. It was time to bring it down. So we called our tree guy. Yes, we have a tree guy. Don’t you?

He had wanted to get here before the leaves budded out this year, but that didn’t happen. Finally last Saturday he showed up.

They got here at 9:30 and worked all day in the heat and humidity. I’m not sure when they left because we’d had to leave to go to my best friend’s wedding. When we got home all that was left was this trunk.

Our neighbors had already asked about the wood, so we told them to come get it. Their son heats with wood so it’s always nice to get some for free. We were just happy that we wouldn’t have to deal with it.

You can see the sun poking through the tree on the other side of the street. These trees kept the front of the house shaded until about 10:30 or 11 in the morning. However, with it gone this is what our living room looks like at 7 a.m.:

It’s so bright!

I had to laugh because I had taken the bird feeders down before the tree guy showed up so that he could drop the limbs any where on the front lawn without trying to avoid things. Well, the birds were NOT happy. Little did they know what was soon to happen to their tree! It did make me wonder, though, what the people who buy this house when we move are going to think as the birds descend upon their front lawn and demand food. They might think that they are in an Alfred Hitchcock movie!

Wednesday I got home and noticed that the tree guy had been back.

I should have taken some pictures up close so that you could see the massive size of this tree. Jay works with our tree guy and he said that he had been surprised at just how big this tree really was. A quick glance and I was a bit irritated because the tree didn’t show a lot of signs of bad health. You could see insect trails where they had been chewing up the inside, but not what I had expected.

Then the neighbors came over with their son’s buddy and they started to cut up these massive pieces and split them. Jay has a chainsaw so he went out to help. Well, I have a little experience doing wood, too, so I thought I would go out and help a little bit. Here are my credentials:

Let’s just say that I know my way around a log splitter.

Of course, the other night I’m out in my sweatskirt (my knit skirt, similar to sweatpants), my Croc sandals (my Cleos), and a tank top. Obviously not your typical wood chopping outfit. However, I had just figured I would help stack the wood in the truck. It’s difficult to run a wood splitter, handle the wood, and keep everything where you want it all by yourself so I stepped in. The wife was very worried that I was going to drop it on my foot. I was very conscious of not having decent footwear for the type of work that I was doing, so I told her that I was good.

It made me feel a little better that as we were splitting the bigger pieces we were finding all kinds of rot and decay in the middle. Not that rot and decay are good, but I didn’t want to feel like we had cut down a perfectly good tree. I’m not a tree hugger, but I’m not a tree hater either. We plan on planting another tree once we’ve taken care of the stump and fixed the sidewalk. Our other neighbors have what look like Crimson King Norway Maple trees planted in their front yard so we might go with one of those to make them look like they belong a little better. Or we might choose something else. Who knows.

We managed to get quite a lot done in the two hours that I was out there. Yes, I had to go inside before they had finished for the night. You see, there was an incident.

Ha! You thought it was going to be my foot! Nope. I managed to get my finger smashed between a hunk of wood and the end of the wood splitter. I’ve got a nice cut on the top and the whole area is bruised. I over-did it with the gauze, however, I was doing it left-handed and just wanted to get some pressure put on it. It wasn’t bad, and seriously no matter what Jay says I’m not a wimp, but as I was taping it up I started to get light-headed. Before going to bed we removed my bandage and Jay did it up properly.

I guess some dreams just aren’t meant to come true. My dreams of being a hand model are now completely shot. *sigh*