Leaves

Dan and I moved into this house at the end of the summer. We live at the end of a dead end street amidst a beautiful forest. When we originally saw this house we fell in love with the yard and area. Green, green trees and lush forests backing up to a state park. We were excited to live in such a glorious place. Well, two months later we got our rude awakening to New England. The leaves started to fall off the trees and onto our yard. One day, as Maddie was napping, I headed out and started to rake leaves into a pile. My neighbor came out of his house and started laughing. He yelled at his wife to come and take a look. They both looked at me and started to laugh...a knee-slapping, whooping laughter. I started to sorta giggle a bit wondering what was so funny. "What?", I asked. My neighbor pointed up to the trees surrounding us. "do you see all those leaves?". "Yeah." They all still have to fall. A couple weeks later, when the leaves were as high as my mid-calf all over our lawn I noticed all our neighbors coming out with these super-duper leaf blowers and tractors and lawnmowers that mulch. For a few days the neighborhood was abuzz with motors and machines. Result: leaves gone. Dan and I worked every weekend for a month, raking leaves onto huge tarps and pulling the tarps into the forest and dumping leaves into huge mounds. It took FOREVER! It still takes forever.
Do I love New England in the fall...absolutely. It is the most gorgeous place on the planet. Do I love the mess it makes...I get anxiety everytime I see the first blushes of pink in the trees for I know what is coming.
Yesterday I went out and decided to blow the leaves off our driveway before the rain storm today. One thing led to another and I did the front lawn too. It took me 5 hours....sigh. I posted some pics...and yeah...notice how many more leaves are on the trees.