Leaf Day

It was “leaf day” at our household this Saturday. Everyone worked on getting a couple acres worth of property cleared of leaves. Since we have a sort of savannah, trees interspersed among the grassed yard, that means we can’t just let the leaves sit all winter; they blow everywhere in the winter winds, anyway. It is like doing an entire city block worth of raking and gathering.

So everyone was busy at it, the children with the rakes and the husband with the leaf vacuum. He likes to burn the collected leaves, and I divert as many as possible onto my veggie garden area. Or the compost pile. Today it was mainly on the freshly tilled garden.

I should have mowed the grass, but I was too busy rounding up escaping kids. It isn’t like everyone is terribly mature and responsible around here. I had to tell the youngest three times to do one area over. He thinks he can get away with giving a token performance and mom will simply get tired and give up. I often do, but today I felt it was important that he try to do the job right…. and that meant tracking him down after checking on whether it was completed or not. I hate that part of parenting.

My determination arose from the knowledge that this lovely day of dry leaves and sunshine would not be forever, and the job needed to be done, now, to avoid some very uncomfortable cold, wet, and windy circumstances that are not long in coming. I heard that this week we could even see some snow. I don’t believe that, but surely it will get cold and wet, and there is nothing more miserable than raking mounds of wet leaves in cold, windy weather. I would much rather sit inside and sip some hot cocoa. And we all know that there is little chance I could get the troops to help me under those conditions, anyway….

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