What a saw and some loppers can do to a garden

I am halfway through hacking back the garden. My mother valiantly stood all morning and chopped up the branches into little pieces to fit more into the recycling bin, while I attacked the trees and creepers, ivy and other random things growing where I most certainly did not plant them. I had to get out the saw after a while to get rid of the branches.

You can see the bald tree behind the storage shed. It was a pyrocantha (??) type of thingy with every leaf a thorn. It also happens to be in my neighbour's garden. Well, the tree trunk is in their garden, but the tree is in mine, and was hanging over the entire patio and irritating me intensely. I like going barefoot, and with those leaves, it is impossible. So it is history. And before you ask....yes, I CAN cut down anything on my side of the boundary!

Then I spent a couple of hours sitting on that kitchen chair (which I used to climb onto the roof of the shed thingy..... thank heavens my mother does not think of taking photos) chopping up the thorny branches. Please note the branches obscuring the patio. It was a big tree.

Did I mention branches? Lots of them. With thorns.

In addition to the full recycling bin (we have a special one for garden stuff) I filled these huge bags too.

And this is what I have left in the beds I did yesterday. I am in the process of emptying every pot and replanting stuff, and then I will put down that cloth to stop weeds. When I go and buy it. I used a mini hoe to chop up the roots of the ivy, which is everywhere. Don't worry, by next summer, it will be an overflowing English garden again.
And this was the village church this morning early in the gentle sunlight. It all looked golden and rather beautiful, when I went to get Mum's paper.

Now I am off to continue with the massacre of the garden. The nails are history and my gloves appear to have holes the size of craters. But I will conquer the weeds. (I will take a photo of the loppers, Barb. I have no idea what you call them. They are great!)