Home Improvements
In the spring our railroad-tie retaining wall in the backyard finally reached the end of its life, falling back into the "jungle" in two stages, and taking with it our chain link fence and a chunk of our yard!

Our yard had been built up by the previous owner with mostly chunks of concrete and a fairly thin layer of dirt over it - so the fallen yard was a big pit of concrete. We had landscapers come re-shape the backyard, re-creating the hill in the back. They covered it with mulch, and we like it SO MUCH BETTER.  Just a bit hard to keep stray balls in the yard!

And this is the new retaining wall in the front. We took out all the grass in that strip between the driveway and the walk, and will put in some plantings next spring.  Just when it seemed we had spent enough on home improvements this year....  you will notice the big stack of white packets by the sidewalk...  yes, none other than a new roof.  We had lost a gutter in the massive snow over the spring. Finally got a roofer out to look at it, as well as figure out why we have a leak in our closet. I guess all those shingles that keep blowing off in every storm have left some bare patches on our roof!!