infrastructure part 3 (septic)

We finally had "the wizard of ooze" (I know, cringe) come by to pump the septic system and do an inspection. He recommended having the pipes replaced--both the one connecting the house to the tank, and from the tank to the leach field.

We called the excavator he recommended, and a few days later the lawn was dug up, the pipes laid down and the trench was filled back in.

Just as we experienced our first hard frost, a few days later we were surprised by sunny, balmy weather, perfect for planting grass seed. Peter spent a lot of time raking the dirt out flat again, and pulling many, many small rocks that had come to the surface during the project.

Peter has a new evening ritual of giving the seeds a light watering just as the sun sets. 

It feels so good to have the unglamorous but important nuts and bolts on the property well upgraded. The driveway, drainage, tree removal and septic are checked off the "to do" list and now we are on to contractors. We are in conversation with several and hope to have things decided on before the snow flies. 

There are some very exciting things on the horizon for our family in 2015...

-Karen

infrastructure part 2 (tree removal and septic)

Bruce, proudly aged 70, working the spruce.

The day finally arrived for the tree removal to begin- a very large white pine (precariously close to the house), 2 ailing spruces, and 2 other smaller evergreens.  While we were expecting some heavy duty equipment to arrive, Bruce and Earl  (combined age 145 years!) showed up with their pickup, a few chainsaws, and a vintage chipper towed behind a small dump truck.  At that point the three day work estimate made more sense…

They methodically set to work, with Bruce gradually climbing the trees with his chain saw and pole saw, and Earl handling the pieces that were cut from the trunk.  Branches were removed on the climb up, and trunks were segmented on the way down, and then the chipper went to work.  Our exposure to the road and views to the mountains were suddenly opened up, sacrificing some shade on the house but eliminating the fear of crashing trees during our regular raging winds.  We now have a pile of chips composting for future use, and a pile of rather large trunk sections that are gradually being relocated to the woods.  The clump of ash trees was also pruned, which had the added benefit of becoming firewood- unfortunately the evergreens are not useful for indoor burning.

Once the towering white pine was down on the ground, we found rot where the tree trunk forked, and so we felt especially grateful to have it removed before the winter storms start blowing.

The chips and brush were all raked up, and a few dents in the lawn have now been filled in, so we are enjoying the new vistas and moving on to the next project…the septic system.

Our house has a septic system that was installed some time in the early 1980’s, and the former owner had provided a rough description of its location.  Initial efforts to locate it had provided some vigorous exercise but no success- if you ever saw the movie “Holes” you can relate to our efforts! Eventually on hole #6 (dubbed “6th sense”) Peter hit the concrete tank about 18 inches below the surface, and fortunately landed directly on top of one of the covers, marked by 2 rusty handles.  With further exploration, a second cover was located near the first, so we called the local septic company to reschedule a visit to come check it out.

According to the septic service, there should be 3 covers approximately 4 feet apart, and so far we had found 2 covers about 2 feet apart, which was a mystery to the “boss” at the septic service. Perhaps some further digging will be needed, but he will come by to check it out next time he is in the area- “could be a few days or maybe a few weeks”.  Vermont Time is just something you need to work with sometimes!  We hope everything checks out eventually so we can cross off septic concerns from our infrastructure list.

-Peter