When we first bought our land we were struck by the sheer beauty of the natural world here;  the trees, the sky, the rotting vehicles rusting in the sunset.  Ok, not so much with the rotting vehicle love but unfortunately there were plenty of them.  Despite there being way more lovely I couldn’t quite get past this sort of thing.

It would hurt to see this stuff all over our beautiful land, it felt like an affront.   Now when I walk to this part of the field (nearby but not on the exact spot, we’ve decided not to plant or raise living things in that area) I see this:

Much, much better.  Our chicken houses may not be utterly stylish just yet (I have painting plans) but they are beautiful to my eye and show the land is productive once more.

Another offender in the inherited junk stakes was a gloomy old shed/building out the back of the house.  It sat grey and hulking, threatening to fall but not quite doing it.   Glaring at us with it’s broken windows, it symbolised the neglect and abandonment this place has suffered.

Now, however, it looks like this:

The burnable stuff will be part of our Bonfire Night party, the metal will go to the scrappy and the plastic to the landfill (unfortunately).  In the place of the Horrid Shed of Possible Murder (over active imagination?  moi?) is this beauty:

A mere 14 hours of hard labour in high humidity by Stephen and our friend Shawn (heroes both of them) turned one of my least favourite places into a cosy home for George the tractor.  As well as being testament to what two hard working chaps can do in a day, it takes us a step closer to turning our land into a small farm and keeps our precious tractor safe and snuggly.  Perfect.

And last but not least:

Um, well, yes…it may not look like much now, but I can assure you when the elements have done their work this will be the pond to end all ponds.  What used to be The Boggy Pit of Tractor Eating Hell (snaps to our neighbour Dave who rescued George from the bog and also pointed out that the wettest point on our land would be the perfect spot for a pond), is now a 15ft deep pond with a duck extension that is 3ft deep.  I’m assured by Hector, one of our excavators, that 3ft deep is the optimum for ducks and that they don’t like anything deeper so an extension was dug!

The pond has also provided us with around 200+ loads of fill (at $200 a load that is a big saving) and we may even be able to run a geothermal pump through it at a later date.  Even if not it will be a happy playground for future ducks and geese as well as a watering hole for local wildlife.

Although the house is the major project I’m also seeing how we are making our mark on the land too, beginning to shape it into a farm, bringing something neglected and abandoned, back to life.