A New Season ... Another Pile of Dirt

So did you survive your Summer Solstice celebrations? DH's celebration incurred a lot of work. He got another 10 tons of dirt delivered yesterday and proceeded to start filling in the bank between the creek and the patio level. His goal is to bring it up to the level of the garden area which will help control erosion issues we have been noticing during our heavy rainstorms. Eventually this will push the yard out toward the creek another 5-6 feet, give us a gentler slope, and even more eventually, allow for a gazebo or pergola on that side. 

He's talking about putting up a gazebo on the side closest to the creek.
I'm pulling more for a pergola - a bit less grand in scope. Either
one, however, are at least two years in the future. 

During the moving of all of this dirt, our old wheelbarrow finally gave up. We've had the old wheelbarrow for a long, long time. One of the handles was broken off, the edging around the actual basin was rusted and broken off in places, the wheel constantly needed to be refilled because it would go flat quickly, and the wedges keeping the handle and wheel aligned properly were falling out. 

Our new wheelbarrow is quite similar to this
photo, except our handles are also red. But
it really doesn't matter what it looks like. The
only thing that matters is whether or not
it will do the job. 

We had purchased a new, unassembled wheelbarrow several years ago and, knowing that the old one was on its last legs, had found the various parts and gathered them together over the past few weeks. We were going to dump brush at the compost and assemble the new wheelbarrow on Sunday, but then he decided to have a lazy day instead. Other times this week when I suggested putting it together also passed without movement. But choice left him yesterday afternoon. 

Our old wheelbarrow was in much worse
shape than this photo. Our curled rim around
the basket was starting to fall off from rust. 

The old wheelbarrow lost one of its wedges and became unusable. Catastrophe! He said he needed help to assemble the new wheelbarrow, but I would be at work for several more hours. I told him to Google assembly instructions and watch a few videos, but that I'd be happy to help him when I got home from work. I'm not sure if he watched videos or not, but an hour or so later he sent a photo of the new bright red wheelbarrow, assembled and ready to get to work. 

Once again I have a large pile of dirt in my
front yard that needs to be transported down
to the lower yard. This is last year's dirt pile,
I was too rushed to get a photo of this year's
pile yet. 

Today he can get back to work and move the rest of the dirt. I think he probably moved about three tons yesterday, but that leaves seven tons of dirt to move today. No rest for the wicked at all. His car is back in the shop, too, so he's pretty much housebound for the day. Summer is starting out with a bang! Have an excellent Friday and I'll be back tomorrow. Who knows what else today will bring? Hmmmmmm.......