Views Around Our New Property

I loaded photos several evenings ago and was too tired to write captions.

Some of the hours that I spend there are waiting to be useful [holding an end of measuring tapes as Jim lays out the spot for the foundation of a new house.]

Wild turkeys are prolific--we see them each time we are there.

The property address is 'Turkey Flatt'--perhaps the extra 'T' is meant to look elegant!

The above was a zoom shot looking toward the eastern property line which is marked by a fence behind the hedgerow.

Weather hasn't been really pleasant here this week--sultry heat even when the sky is overcast, frequent showers, followed by steamy sunshine.

I took this photo as I drove in the lane--a longer private roadway connects the three lots that make up Turkey Flatt to the main road above.

Jim has always done his own site excavation preparatory to pouring a concrete foundation.

While he no longer has the equipment to pour the foundation, he has been trolling craigslist for weeks to find a backhoe to meet his requirements.

He found this one early on Wednesday, located 2 hours away in Tennessee and invited me to ride along for the purchase.

The sky was increasingly dark and as we reached our destination a storm broke with rumbles of thunder, wind and lashing rain. An hour later, the storm over, Jim had completed his 'wheelin and dealin', the machine was loaded and we trundled home.

Jim is never happier than when 'digging' in the dirt.

Here he is opening a trench for new water and power lines.

As there was formerly a house on the property--sited beyond the backhoe--a strange choice--electric and water service is there, but needing to be rerouted for our chosen building site.

Waiting to be useful, I wander around the property, camera in hand, trying to visualize it as the place where we will live.

The open lay of the land narrows as it reaches the western boundary, with a sloping ravine on either side. Joe Pye weed is in full and heady bloom down the bank with goldenrod beginning to show color.

The shaggy pink flower heads were alive with butterflies, mostly swallowtails.  My zoom lens didn't pick them up clearly and I wasn't about to go slithering down the bank through the weeds.

A black swallowtail in a clump of ironweed.

This swallowtail posed nicely for a split second.

Wild ageratum. 

The prospect of creating a new house is exciting, even knowing that it entail months of work.

The too familiar reality of packing up our current home when the time comes, is daunting--exhausting even to contemplate.