Santa Maria... it's another miracle!

The new house is proving to be full of mystical powers. Yesterday, I went over and taking advantage of the "good" weather (read: cloudy but no rain no mist no damp), I decided to tackle the much neglected backyard. We have one big... scratch that... huge Maple tree and one wee little Plum tree out back. The maple is about 15-18 years old and there were about 10 leaves left on it. The rest were all over the backyard... you do the math!

About 3 hours into the task, I began to realize just how the folks in Galilee felt when they were fed with just 5 loaves and 3 fish - surprised, awed and bloody confused trying to figure it all out!

No matter how fast I raked and gathered leaves, there just seemed to be more! My dad & I filled about 8 bags and that only covered about 1/3rd of the yard! Every time the wind blew a leaf off the tree, another seemed to magically appear and take its place. I was starting to feel like I was in some sort of Disney cartoon like when Donald battles the groundhog or the squirrel or the chipmunks... well you get the picture. There's a lot of frantic running around, internal swearing, yelling and kicking things followed by other things blowing up..... but it still ends with the squirrel/ groundhog/ chipmunk winning!

I went back to the house this morning to drop off some more boxes and took a quick look out at the back. Where there had been a clean yard last evening, there now was a carpet of leaves and waddya know.... 10 leaves still clung to the 'ol Maple.

I said a little prayer.... and went in search of the rake.