Tossing Wood

I thought about titling this 'Stacking Wood' but there really wasn't any stacking involved! We went to Adrian's Mum & Dad's the other night for dinner and afterwards the boys got to work loading the trailer with wood to go to camp. They love stacking wood and are usually eager to help out. Even Andrew got to work, although I suspect the fact that Grandma and Grandpa had offered them cash to do the job helped a lot in how much effort he put into it! lol! This wood was leftover from when they had a wood-burning furnace in the basement. That has since been replaced by a propane one and although we used some of the wood in our own woodstove at home last winter, much of it was falling apart from having sat for four years. This was decomposer heaven, for sure!

Matthew has a good arm and had no trouble tossing even the large pieces of wood into the trailer. He's small but mighty! It was funny to hear the kids talking about what they were uncovering, the closer they got to the damp bottom of the pile. There were so many different types of bugs and spiders and we heard a running commentary along the way. They remembered our study of food webs from last spring and were happily exchanging thoughts on what role each bug took. They uncovered woodlice, ants, millipedes, centipedes, various other ones that they knew the names for and I don't remember, plus a number of trap-door spiders and other types of spiders. Grandma and I superved with nice cups of tea in hand!

Nicholas is not all that fond of bugs but did the work without any problem until he uncovered a spider, then another. Spiders are without a doubt his least favourite creepy-crawly. He said to us, "We should change this from 'wood stacking' to 'spider whacking' because there are certainly enough spiders to make it a good game!"

They made good time and had one pile of wood loaded into the trailer. That was all that would fit, so we'll go back next week to load the other one. They were rewarded, not only with money, but with a splash in the hot tub, too. I'm not sure which they considered the better reward!