Flashback Friday: Here, before it was Here

I am in the process of going through my old digital pictures and trying to remember the good stories...before I forget them all.  In 2007, we came down Here to celebrate Easter with Grandad.  Here are some great pictures of the yard how it used to be...

The old porch before A and M rebuilt it.  And see that bushy tree on the left?  It used to grow out of a mounded area in the backyard.  Last summer M pulled it out and flattened the mound.  We had no idea that it covered an abandoned septic tank.  Oh? I haven't mentioned the second tank that was discovered during our latest project?  Well, I'll never mention it again either.  And you don't either. 

In this picture, IJ (almost 5 years old) and S (3 1/2) are looking around the rocks for a snake.  The rocks are buried in the abandoned trenches.  Oh? I didn't mention that some our trenches had to be refilled because the county found a teensy tiny bit of clay at the very end?  And the whole drain field had to be moved 20 feet the other direction?  Even though there was nothing but sand under where the actual drain field was?  I'll never mention it again either.  Because the pipes are buried and the story is over.  That beautiful maple on the left was cut down when we first moved here and the stump is in the middle of the pasture, waiting to be burned.

The log the kids are sitting on was turned into benches that reside down by the pond.  The stump is now in the pasture waiting to be burned.  And that beautiful field behind us is where the chicken yard is now!  It's amazing how different everything is!

This entire area has been cleared and flattened.  And replanted with fruit trees.  And we still miss Grandad.

But even though so much has changed...some things remain the same!