Day 209

When the representative from the waterfowl organization was at the farm, he mentioned that part of his work involved researching our land and surrounding properties to get a bit of an idea about what he would encounter at his visit. He looked at historical maps of the property, investigated the ditches that criss-crossed our property, and focused on weather levels as they would be essential information to understand and utilize should we install a scrape. While he was generally pleased with what he saw in our restoration process, he was moved enough to make a comment about something that was bothering him.

Just a few days earlier, the lot next door to us was visited by some large machinery. The shrubs and plants that had overtaken the previously farmed field were leveled and much of the land was scraped, leaving some impressive piles of dirt and a lot ready to start building a house on. My son was ecstatic to see the big diggers moving dirt. He adorably mimicked their actions with our own mini dirt pile. We watched as the machines first put up a fence. Then they started scraping the land and creating piles of dirt. While my son was happily entertained by the sights and sounds, our latest visitor was not.

The gentleman said he was very surprised not only that someone would build on this land, but that they were even allowed to in the first place. He predicted lots of water issues for the owners of that lot and hinted that some of those issues could trickle (literally) onto us.

Yippee.

We had already thought the same and had done our due diligence in investigating the possible addition of a berm and/or trees on the property line. However, with limited funds for that type of project and more than enough already on our plates, we decided to use the “wait and see” approach, hoping that our neighbors-to-be might be proactive and do much of the work so we don't have to. 

While we wait for the new house construction to progress, we’ll continue to focus on what we can control.

But we’ll definitely have some fun along the way.