I’ve been in my house for about ten years. Lots of things change in ten years. My children all grew up. My granddaughter was born. And then another and grandsons. I changed jobs a couple of times. My hair got a little greyer. And many of my children moved out to go on church missions or head off to college.
But, through it all we’ve been int he same house. But, it’s not really the same house. That became clear to me the a few days ago when I happened to look at Google Streetviews.
We’ve made a lot of changes over the years.
Here’s a picture of our house from ten years ago courtesy of Google’s Streetview.
It was all we could do to get the grass to grow when we moved in
We made changes each year. A little at a time. And this is the house after ten years of home improvements.
We still work on the grass, but now we have more to keep growing. The rainbow happened to be an added bonus
We planted trees. We planted flowers. We added a new mailbox. You can’t see it, but there’s a fairy garden under the trees.
As much as the front changed, the side changed even more. Here’s a picture of the side yard ten years ago.
I hated mowing that hill.
The dandelions were terrible in the spring. The previous owner mowed down the weeds and put sod over it. The weeds were an issue for years.
Here’s a picture of the side yard today.
Moving the rocks was a lot of work but I reminded myself how much I hated mowing that hill
We built the rock walls, of course. The lower bricks are from Home Depot, but the other rocks are from local building lots.
We built steps
And planted the trees, of course.
We also dug out the area around the fire hydrant.
We also fenced the backyard and added a playset for the grandkids. And, we added the garden boxes and other garden areas.
The changes were so gradual that I hardly noticed them year to year. It’s kind of like watching your kids grow up. They are 12 and then all of a sudden they are 21 and getting married.
There’s still work to do. But, it’s nice to be reminded of the progress we’ve made.
Stay safe
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren. Order Miscellany II, an anthology including his latest short story, “The Mercy System” here
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