This weekend’s activities included yard work (on our own yard this time) and a 4th of July party at friends.
The party was fun. Our friends are on the parade route in their town, so we got to watch the kids be super excited for the parade (and candy).
The story that I want to tell you more about is around the yard work.
We have two low decorative walls that mark the back edges of our yard. One wall on each side. They were here when we moved in and probably put in before both our neighbors put up their fences. Both walls have fallen over in places.
A friend of ours bought a house in the countryside a couple years ago and is working on landscaping it this summer. So, she wants them.
Nate’s (my husband) plan for Saturday morning is to load them into a small trailer and drive them out.
The process was to load about 8 of the large bricks/stones onto a dolly and take them to the front yard to put in the trailer.
That’s when we realize how many bricks/stones that small wall was made out of.
After 5 trips we’d moved over 40 bricks/stones twice (onto the dolly and then off). And we’re tired.
But there are three problems:
- We’ve only removed one wall and the other one is longer and has at least 80 stones to move.
- The stones are heavy and Nate’s noticed one of the welds on the bottom of the trailer has loosened.
- There are more stones than he anticipated and he’s not sure our friend will want them all.
So, what to do? Nate had anticipated that we’d complete this project on Saturday morning.
Alright, so the decision wasn’t really that hard.
We decided we were done moving stones for the day.
The trailer was able to hold what we had and we dropped it off at our friend’s house. She was thrilled. We asked her what she was going to do with them and she hadn’t quite decided yet, but she wants ALL of the stones that are remaining in our yard (yay for us!).
When she and her husband unload the trailer, we’ll probably spend the following weekend filling it back up for her.
And Nate already has a game plan for how to make that process go smoother.
But you might be wondering, why the heck I’m sharing this story with you?
Have you ever set aside a day in your business to complete a project?
You figure with the whole day dedicated to the ONE project that you’ll easily complete it.
But it quickly becomes apparent that there’s more to do than you anticipated (more stones in that wall to move than you thought)?
So, what do you do?
Often, we push our way through, working a really long day to get as much done as possible.
And that’s not always a bad thing.
However, sometimes, if you take a step back or away from the situation, you might find some alternatives.
In the case of our remaining retaining wall, Nate’s going to borrow a small vehicle that can pull the trailer to the retaining wall (so we’re moving each brick once instead of twice and then he won’t have to push them through the yard either). And he realized a slightly different way we can arrange them in the trailer to balance it better.
In the case of a project for your business, you might need to step away and ask for help or suggestions from someone who’s done something similar.
And sometimes stepping away from something gives us a new perspective on it and we think of a different way to approach it.
As for this week’s Wednesday LIVE with Evie, it’s taking the week off to celebrate the holiday 🙂
However, it will return next week to its normal time of Wednesday at 1pm CT.
If you have any questions or a topic that you’d like to see covered, please hit reply and share it with me!