real life: kind of sad
We moved into this house last August and I absolutely love it here. So do the kids. Well a little after we moved in someone bought the house next door. No big deal except they have 4 (yes FOUR) very annoying little dogs who go in their backyard and then bark at everything for all eternity. The people on the other side of us have a big dog and he can get all the way over to their fence and just stares at them and the little dogs go crazy.
Anyway, that's not my problem. Actually I don't have a problem, per say. The other day the kids told me that the neighbors planned to cut down the trees in their yard. According to what the neighbors told them their decision was based on 2 things.
1: the trees make a mess in their yard. They are some kind of flowering tree and when they bloomed we had little pink flowers all over the place. I thought it looked pretty. Apparently having little leaves (in the fall) and flowers (in the spring) is too much work/too much mess for them. I don't know why but this makes me sad and seems like such a lame excuse to cut down to gorgeous and obviously old trees.
2: they don't want my kids climbing in them. The trees just about straddle the property line. I had no issues with the kids climbing in them or the little one that is in our yard. Their trees were perfect for climbing with low limbs and lots of footholds. They couldn't get very high and even my 5yo could climb the one for a few feet. I took pictures of her in it having the time of her life on her birthday. I never thought twice about it (having been a tomboy and climbed my share of trees as a kid). But, it's their property so there wasn't anything I could do about it. They told the kids we could sue if they fell out and they'd be liable (which is true). Problem is I'd never sue. If one of my kids fell out the kid would be the only one to blame...for being careless enough to fall out. I hate how litigious our society has become.
So they came today and are cutting both trees down. We're going to lose all of the shade on the front of the house (which is south facing and even up here in Washington state is a big deal... it does get hot here in the summer) and the kids are going to lose the two best climbing trees on the block.
This just makes me sad and reminds me of when we lived in Pennsylvania. We lived in this upstairs apartment on a property with another apartment and 2 houses. Right behind our building there was this tree, it butted up to our back deck and shaded the entire back side of the house and the porch. It was so pretty and in the fall the kids had a blast raking and playing in the leaves. We went to Chicago for Christmas the 2nd year we lived there and when we got back the tree was gone. The kids were devastated and the landlord never even mentioned cutting it down. All the neighbors were kind of shocked. I'm sure they had a legitimate reason. It did come up right next to the basement bulkhead and was rubbing on the roof of our porch but it was still sad and after that we had no privacy on our porch (and our bathroom window...a regular double hung one...looked out onto the porch so I never felt comfortable leaving the blinds up while in there after the tree was gone.
Oh well.
Anyway, that's not my problem. Actually I don't have a problem, per say. The other day the kids told me that the neighbors planned to cut down the trees in their yard. According to what the neighbors told them their decision was based on 2 things.
1: the trees make a mess in their yard. They are some kind of flowering tree and when they bloomed we had little pink flowers all over the place. I thought it looked pretty. Apparently having little leaves (in the fall) and flowers (in the spring) is too much work/too much mess for them. I don't know why but this makes me sad and seems like such a lame excuse to cut down to gorgeous and obviously old trees.
2: they don't want my kids climbing in them. The trees just about straddle the property line. I had no issues with the kids climbing in them or the little one that is in our yard. Their trees were perfect for climbing with low limbs and lots of footholds. They couldn't get very high and even my 5yo could climb the one for a few feet. I took pictures of her in it having the time of her life on her birthday. I never thought twice about it (having been a tomboy and climbed my share of trees as a kid). But, it's their property so there wasn't anything I could do about it. They told the kids we could sue if they fell out and they'd be liable (which is true). Problem is I'd never sue. If one of my kids fell out the kid would be the only one to blame...for being careless enough to fall out. I hate how litigious our society has become.
So they came today and are cutting both trees down. We're going to lose all of the shade on the front of the house (which is south facing and even up here in Washington state is a big deal... it does get hot here in the summer) and the kids are going to lose the two best climbing trees on the block.
This just makes me sad and reminds me of when we lived in Pennsylvania. We lived in this upstairs apartment on a property with another apartment and 2 houses. Right behind our building there was this tree, it butted up to our back deck and shaded the entire back side of the house and the porch. It was so pretty and in the fall the kids had a blast raking and playing in the leaves. We went to Chicago for Christmas the 2nd year we lived there and when we got back the tree was gone. The kids were devastated and the landlord never even mentioned cutting it down. All the neighbors were kind of shocked. I'm sure they had a legitimate reason. It did come up right next to the basement bulkhead and was rubbing on the roof of our porch but it was still sad and after that we had no privacy on our porch (and our bathroom window...a regular double hung one...looked out onto the porch so I never felt comfortable leaving the blinds up while in there after the tree was gone.
Oh well.