Dayton Family

Sure, the counter is the natural place to read...nice try dude! (but it does make for an awesome camera moment) 

 Saintly neighbor tilling the ground to prepare the garden ground for next year

This is the 'before' shot of our leaves...doesn't look so bad in the picture, but if you can see that nice-sized pile that was just from the little green area you see surrounding it, maybe you can get an idea. It took almost 6 hours of blowing & bagging. Omagoodness it was a LOT of work (I also underestimated how sore my arms would be from holding the blower that long ooooohhh...)

Tree break

Back to work--one of the many many many bags full to the brim with leaf-i-ness

Full crew (gratefully Tony joined in for the last hour or so--he was doing mega homework--I don't think we would have made it without him). At one point I was raking by myself for like, 20 minutes, wondering where the boys were, getting first frustrated & then worried... Tony came out & went looking for them. Eventually they emerged (literally) from one of the monster leaf piles. What?! I told them it would have been a lot funnier if they had only been 'gone' for 5 minutes.

This picture is two-fold--first, the slobber--sheesh! Secondly to show how this dude sits up all by himself (though we don't leave him since his tip-over factor is still at 95%)