Holes

I enjoyed reading the children's novel called "Holes." The children in the book dig holes at a punitive forced labor camp. The story is interesting, and you should go read the book if you haven't already. Today, we worked on some holes of our own.

We are building a playset for the children. After about a year of delays, we are finally getting it started. To begin, we had to dig eight holes to put gigantic posts into the ground. Each hole has to be four feet deep. When we first moved, Jeff and Keegan dug such a hole for our mailbox using a manual post-hole digger. Admittedly, a manual post-hole digger is much better than a shovel, but it still takes a lot of work, especially in the hard clay we have.

Our neighbors in the area are very nice, and we all share different farm implements with one another. One neighbor has an automatic post-hole digger tractor attachment. We borrowed it and began to dig our holes yesterday. Jeff and I managed to get about two feet into the ground in eight spots.

Another neighbor came over and told us that post hole digging is often a two day job in our tough clay soil area. He explained that we would only get two feet deep. Next, we needed to fill the holes with water to allow the clay to soften overnight. Then, we could come back and finish the holes the next day. So, of course, that is what we did.

We came back this afternoon, and we could only get through four of the holes to four feet. This involved Jeff or I putting our weight on the post-hole digger so it would go down deeper. While running the tractor, we would take the digger up and down, which would fling the muddy clay out of the hole.

Finally, we had our one neighbor come over and help us. One person worked the tractor while two people put their weight on the digger. Our neighbor said that he thought there might have been a problem with our tractor. (I can't even begin to explain what that problem was, so I shall not try.) Finally, our neighbor got his tractor, which is a bit more powerful.


two neighbors, Jeff, a borrowed tractor, and lots of mud


Keep that digger movin'!

Well, seven of the holes are finished. Then, my darlings decided to play in the mud. Actually, they asked permission, and after a clothing change, they were granted permission.


my lovely mud puppies


Oh, what fun!

Results: We still have to manually dig out one of the posts after it dries out tomorrow. Blah!