Hey there! We all survived the "illness", we're all intact, and live on to see new days! I was worried for awhile, though, sheesh......

I guess the biggest news is of the clear-cut that recently happened in our yard. This past September, a new school opened up at the back of our property (Yay! Hot lunches for Ben to come home to one day!!). The city of Surrey wrote us and politely advised us that there were 3 trees from our property hanging over onto the schoolground property, posing a danger to the safety of the children, and could we kindly have them removed ASAP. So we had the tree-guy come and give us an estimate on doing this, and it was discovered that we had several dangerous trees (rotten and otherwise) throughout our property and in total 16 trees needed to be taken out. Now, that's alot of trees! But, after having survived the latest wind storms with no damage (although one of the bigger trees fell and missed our shop by mere feet!) we had already decided to do this at some point. So within a week we had Morris the Arborrist here (who has done a bunch of falling for Greg over the past 15 years) and out came all the trees. Just like that - done in one day. Greg even got to help the crew and worked the tree chipper! We can (unfortunately) see and hear pretty much everything that goes on in the schoolyard now, but it's not too bad at the moment, with the trees all starting to bloom. Ask me again come this winter, when we'll definatley notice it. I had some of Benjamin's friends over the day they did it and for the most part, they seemed to enjoy watching all the action.

That really is all that's really "new" around here, we're just pluggin' along, doin' our thing, waiting for summer. And, of course, I've attached more pictures!

Here's a question to fellow bloggers - why is it that once I publish my blog it never looks anything like my preview?? I'm getting increasingly frustrated with my pictures not lining up.......ha ha

This picture really doesn't do justice, because you can't see what's no longer behind the shop or down the tree line

Greg on the chipper

Ben helping Greg put some of the wood out for those who wanted it

Like father, like son
Happy Birthday to me... Ben helped blow out the candles

Hmmm...........

That's a WORM!!!

Aunty Tree, Lee and me!

Future excavator operator?

The Snack Club - Riley, Liam, Ben, Abby

Getting dirty is what little boys do!!

Cool dude!

.....still silly after all these years......(our "hats" are actually Greg's hockey socks)

One, two, three o'clock, four o'clock, rock.......heading off to a surprise 50th birthday party