The Collaborative International Dictionary
Spadeful \Spade"ful\ (sp[=a]d"f[.u]l), n.; pl. Spadefuls (sp[=a]d"f[.u]lz). [Spade + full.] As much as a spade will hold or lift.
Wiktionary
n. (plural of spadeful English)
Usage examples of "spadefuls".
The digging was a gentle process during which they slowly laid small neat spadefuls of earth in a sculptured pile at each side of the armspan-wide trench they were making.
Outside, all the children except for Saturday and Jeopardy were filling in the hole, bringing spadefuls of soil from other areas to make it level and invisible.
He turned back to the burials to see a large orange cat drop a final ferf into the grave before the last few spadefuls of earth covered it.
They threw another layer of weed on top, a tarpaulin over that, then spadefuls of sand.
A hundred or so were digging a long trench, six feet deep, spadefuls of the light chalky earth flying up.
That shoulder rose and fell rhythmically and convulsively, but spadefuls of earth were already being thrown over the whole body.
Each spadeful was nearly weightless, but the number of spadefuls was nearly endless.