oaks


Also found in: Dictionary, Thesaurus, Medical, Acronyms, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia.

little strokes fell great oaks

proverb Large, seemingly impossible tasks can be completed or accomplished through small, steady efforts. A: "This lawsuit is so huge, I just don't see how we'll be able to get through it!" B: "We just take it one step and one day at a time, taking care of what we can, when we can—remember, little strokes fell great oaks." I thought I'd never be able to pay off my student loans, but little strokes fell great oaks, and after 20 years, I'm finally debt free.
See also: fell, great, little, oak, stroke
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2024 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.

oak(s)

(oks)
mod. OK; satisfactory; worthy. (Prisons.) That dude’s oaks.
See also: oak
McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions Copyright © 2006 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
See also:
References in classic literature ?
He only put his oak staff at parry as the other took his stand.
Robin found the stranger as hard to hit as though fenced in by an oak hedge.
The wagon had passed by, rustling down the road, which was carpeted with fallen leaves of maple, oak, and alder.
They spoke in low tones as they passed around the house under great oak trees and came to a stop before a small barn.
For you are to know, that, many years before, King Pelias had been told by the Speaking Oak of Dodona, that a man with one sandal should cast him down from his throne.
The first thing that Jason thought of doing, after he left the king's presence, was to go to Dodona, and inquire of the Talking Oak what course it was best to pursue.
Beyond, in a slightly clearer space, wild grape and honeysuckle swung in green riot from gnarled old oak trees.
He listened greedily to the quail calling, and laughed outright, once, in sheer joy, at a tiny chipmunk that fled scolding up a bank, slipping on the crumbly surface and falling down, then dashing across the road under his horse's nose and, still scolding, scrabbling up a protecting oak.
The shopman (he knows my friend) was naturally a little staggered at first; but, quickly recovering himself, and feeling that something ought to be done to encourage this sort of thing, asked our hero if he would like to see some fine old carved oak. My friend said he would, and the shopman, thereupon, took him through the shop, and up the staircase of the house.
man," expostulated my friend; "you don't mean to say you have covered over carved oak with blue wall-paper?"
It seemed as if the hamadryad of the oak had sheltered herself from the unimaginative world within the heart of her native tree, and that it was only necessary to remove the strange shapelessness that had incrusted her, and reveal the grace and loveliness of a divinity.
He was about to withdraw when his eyes chanced to fall upon a half-developed figure which lay in a corner of the workshop, surrounded by scattered chips of oak. It arrested him at once.
"Still following the tracks of the prints, Larsan and I passed out of the oak grove and reached the border of the lake.
Throwing the rope over the high limb of a giant oak tree, they pulled till the poor Marionette hung far up in space.
One night, about three years after the death of Hetty Parlow, a number of the young people of Blackburg were passing Oak Hill Cemetery in a wagon--if you have been there you will remember that the road to Greenton runs alongside it on the south.