The annual rite of shoveling wood chips is upon us, for five summers we’ve schlepped wood chips throughout the yard in an effort to keep down the weeds in areas where we’ve planted trees hoping someday we’d grow a forest. Sometimes it works well, last winter with very little snow cover and 100+ mile per hour winds…..well, you probably can guess the outcome. We just let the chips fall where they may, so to speak. A new load arrived this week and we are hoping to spread a cushy 6″ layer to smother the clover this summer. Meanwhile our neighbors drive by and wave, shaking their heads at all the work we are doing. It is a better workout than we get in the gym, and keeping us fit. Through the years the wood will disintegrate and turn into a wonderful mulch. Some of my little trees have doubled in size, by the time I’m 90 I’ll have my forest 
Gail Niebrugge, Alaska artist
