Sunday, May 18, 2008

Fun Amongst The Oaks

I'm telling you, it's nothing but fun here Amongst The Oaks. Friday night whilst eating dinner, we heard an ominous ripping sound and looked out the kitchen window just in time to see a large branch falling from our neighbor's oak tree. It landed in our driveway with a crunch and a thud as we stared at each other wide eyed. We ran out to discover that it had glanced off their roof and the fence, bounced off Teen2's window sill and wall, and luckily caused little damage. But it was almost dark and too late to do anything about it.

Saturday morning I got out there with loppers and a pruning saw and started to clean up the mess. The Lord of the Manor had shoulder surgery not long ago and isn't really supposed to do heavy work yet. We don't have a chain saw at home and we couldn't get out of the driveway because of the mess, so what else could we do?

So I worked and worked with my little saw, and we ended up with all this fire wood. We can use it to cook chickens next summer. And if you believe that....well...you shouldn't! Actually we dragged the two largest logs back to the patio and the Lord of the Manor drove down to the shop and got a power saw to cut them up.

Here's the damage. This dent on the window sill and some scrapes on the wall.
And this cracked area on the stucco down by the foundation.
And here's the stub left on the tree. The branch was about 9" across. These valley oaks sometimes drop limbs in the fall when they are heavy with acorns, or in the summer if they are over-watered, but we've never seen one fall in May on an un-irrigated tree. I hope this is a fluke.

Well that's all the crazy news from here *literally* Amongst The Oaks.

7 comments:

travelbug said...

Oh my! What excitement. Glad you didn't have worse property damage and that no one was hurt.

Teacats said...

Good heavens! Lucky there was so little damage to house, home or even family! But very handy for outdoor fireplace ..... great job with the little saw (my DH laughed at that photo!! and then I told about YOUR DH getting the power saw ..... ) GREAT photos!

Jan at Rosemary Cottage

Anonymous said...

Girl, that is quite a bit of cutting you had to do.

Our neighbors had a tree fall (they are two houses away), and it seemed like it shook the whole neighborhood.

I'm so relieved you incurred so little damage.

Tara said...

Wow! Can you use al that wood? I know, you will use it to cook chickens in the outdoor fireplace all summer-love it!

:0)"Tara

Anonymous said...

Well - they'll make a lovely log fire for you. Lucky escape though!

Rhondi said...

Hi Laura
Wow. That could have caused a lot of damage. Glad to see it was minimal. I loved the picture of you cutting it with the little saw LOL.
We need a new roof so every time we have a storm or really strong winds I'm hoping a big limb falls on our roof and we can get it fixed with the insurance money!
Hope you're having a good day today.
That elderberry cordial reminds me of an episode in Anne of Green Gables, when she accidently fed jer friend the elderberry cordial instaed of some other drink. do you know the Anne of Green Gables stories?
Hugs, Rhondi

seanymph said...

You were very lucky. Im here in Ca. too. My neighbor down the road once lost an entire branch off her huge oak. It crashed thru her roof and killed her dining room table. The place was filled with water too from the branch. I was utterly stunned and amazed. But since she had to have that tree removed I got lucky and got a nice cord of oak wood from it for a good price.