A chill in the air

“Autumn has caught us in our summer wear” 

~ Philip Larkin

While not yet Autumn, Sunday I could not get warm.  The weather has definitely cooled down (like 10 degrees below normal) and the a/c units are out of the windows.  Along with Spring this is my favorite time of the year.

A walk along the barn road shows dead leaves starting to accumulate along its edge.  

 A look up into the woods and you notice the trees have lost their vibrant green.  They now wear coats of army green and drab olive.  Soon they will be vibrant again in hues of red, orange and yellow.  The wildflowers or weeds depending on who is talking are blooming.

The multi-flora rosehips are turning red.  

 The hops are past their prime.  

 The acorns are plentiful and the black walnuts 

are making walking across the yard without turning your ankle an impossible feat.

Autumn seems in a rush this year.  The bear is a regular visitor as he tries to put on his winter weight.  The puppy doesn’t like him!  He growls with his hackles up while walking from door to door.  Something took down one of the fawns in the field.  It took ½ one night and ½ the next.  We believe it is the coyotes which are getting to be nightly visitors on the mountain behind us….another thing the puppy doesn’t like!  A small buck was in the yard yesterday, the velvet is off his antlers and his neck looked like it had already started to swell.  And at the man’s worksite there were deep marks of hooves being shoved in the dirt where two bucks had been fighting. 

I have spent the last month canning, knitting and working on the genealogy. A friend knew my tomatoes were not producing what I needed and picked me up 125# from a farm near where he works.  I was kept busy enough that I missed the Endless Mt Fiber Fest. 

I did however enter into their completion and I won on both entries!!!!!  Cyndi from Riverrim was nice enough to take them up for me as she vends there with Grace Hatton.  This year’s project was a cowl.  I entered a crocheted version 

(Main Street byKrista Wolf) which won first place and a knit version 

(Beaded smoke Ring by Jackie Erickson-Schweitzer with a few changes due to time restrictions) which won third place!  I know it’s not like entering into a huge competition such as MD Sheep & Wool or Rhinebeck but its fun.

But back to the gardening/canning….With the addition of the 125# of tomatoes, my  shelves are now stocked with all the BBQ sauce, chili sauce, salsa, bruschetta in a jar, rotel tomatoes, crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce and V8 that I need to get through the year.  The green beans which were late to start are still producing.  I slowed down picking so I can save seed for next year.  The summer squash were nothing to write about but the winter squash are doing fantastic.  I planted two spaghetti and one LI Cheese in the regular garden and I must have 10 spaghetti squash still out there and three cheese.  Up by the barn in a manure pile I also planted one LI cheese, 1 striped cushaw and some saved seed from a sugar pie pumpkin I got from Walmart last year.  I intended to keep moving the fence but the vines soon grew through the roll so I couldn’t move it without breaking the vines. 

However I have four cheese, three cushaw and some sugar pie’s.  The chickens have discovered the sugar pie and are pecking at them.  I had to wrap the others that are growing outside the fence in old feed bags so as not to lose them.

We went blueberry picking in August at Herrick Hill Huckleberry Farm and it was awesome. Toddler O kept eating and every time we asked him how many berries he picked and put in his bucket the answer was three.  His brother Baby B went from person to person, stomped his foot, grunted, put his hand out and waited for it to be filled. We brought home 30 pounds.  I froze some, and then canned blueberry/lime jam, blueberry syrup and blueberry pie filling. This past weekend we went apple picking at Roba’s.  You can quickly fill a ½ bushel as the trees are loaded 

so it wasn’t as much fun as berry picking for the adults or the grandkids.  Closer to Halloween we will go back pumpkin picking and after looking at their cut your own Christmas trees we might have to get our tree there this year. And did you know there are less than 100 days until Christmas?

And in genealogy…I got back into it after being contacted by a relative on my father’s side.  This past week I contacted someone about my grandmother’s sister (or daughter as has always been assumed) on my mom’s side and it ended up being her granddaughter.  Now maybe we can make some head way on our great grandparents.  

And that about wraps it up.