Earthsprings is blessed to have so many people who care deeply about it.  Last weekend about 20 of them came out to work mightily with chain saws, axes, clippers, and a variety of other tools to clear the roads and trails of downed timber from the recent tornado, as well as to do many other maintenance chores.  I am enormously grateful.  Everyone who came worked until they were exhausted!  Each person must have done twenty different things, and we accomplished more than I would have ever believed possible.  Some of those downed trees were huge.

Sadly I was so busy directing traffic I only managed to get a couple of pictures. But I will never forget the image in my mind of Emma atop one of the big limbs of a giant downed oak tree, axe in hand  (we dubbed her Emmazon later).  Or the sight of Terry and Don, exhausted after a full day of loading wood, headed out again to mend fences.  Or of McLean driving back and forth with load after load of wood cut just to size for my wood burning stove for next winter.  Or Margaret and Jim on Sunday morning planning the installation of the new hand pump.  Or Phil on his knees repairing plumbing, or Zac mighty muscle man moving timber, or Brad with his chain saw, or Kerry’s cookies, or Jean and Dawn teetering on a tall ladder mending the garden fence to keep out the deer, or Nancy being just everywhere she was needed, or Forest proving to be amazingly able and willing to do just everything, or Greg heaving logs into this pile and that to be split later, or Jose and his family awakening everyone with the sound of chain saws at dawn…and on and on, more than I can list here.  And there was all the good food everyone brought!  And the laughter and good conversation… And everyone working together so great!

Many thanks to everyone, and especially to Mary Elizabeth for her organizational and directional skills and all her hard work.  Here she is, with Greg, unloading one of many truck loads of wood.

Greg and Mary Elizabeth unloading logs