Fall Color

Here are a couple of images of the fall color that we've enjoyed in our area this year - these are courtesy of my husband:

These were taken about a week ago. Unfortunately time has caused the spectacular color to fade, and now the raking begins...

Happy November!

A few snowflakes are falling from the sky this morning. I hope they don't start falling en masse anytime soon - I've still got the whole backyard to rake!

In search of the Great Pumpkin

Even though my kids are in college, we still like to go out to a pumpkin patch to find our Halloween pumpkins:


We drove way out into the country and found a nice patch where pumpkins of all shapes,:


textures,:

ripeness,:

and configurations, could be found:

And there were plenty to choose from. If you couldn't find your pumpkin in one field, there were other fields off in the distance to scour:

We saw the Great Pumpkin rise out of the pumpkin patch!:

I found the perfect squash!:

I had a hand carrying it back:

When we had each found a perfect specimen, we hauled our pumpkin loot back to the barn:

Where there were pumpkin horses pulling carts loaded with you-know-what:

As we drove away, they seemed to say, "Bye! Come back next year!":

Now comes the hard part - deciding how to carve our Jack-O'Lanterns!

One Fall Color

We've had dreadful weather so far this fall, except for this week. The sun came out, the temperatures were glorious, and I was able to get out and work in the yard.

Although the full palette of fall colors can be seen everywhere else, our yard sticks to a one-color theme:


But in the sunshine, that one color is quite enough:

And this week I stopped wishing for more variation. Who can go wrong with glowing yellow-gold over one's head?

It's been a beautiful week to be outside:

Hat and scarf weather...

It's officially here.

And it's only October. Brrrr.

Coming at the end of winter, this weather would be looked at as a breath of warmth after the frigid months.

But these damp, dark, low-to-mid 40's during the day, and low 30's at night, coming at the end of a cool summer and being presented as fall weather...

Well, all I can say is, Brrrr!

Harbingers of winter

My daughter and I found this woolly bear caterpillar while collecting crabapples the other day:

I can never keep straight what the stripe means. The width of the stripe is supposed to predict how hard the winter will be, but I can't remember if a thick stripe means a harsh winter or a mild winter. And the thing is, I often see thick and thin striped caterpillars trying to predict the same forthcoming winter. I guess they're confused too.

And I saw this on the lolcats website:


I thought it was funny =^.".^=

Warmth

I had to turn the heater on today. It's damp and cold out. There's a frost warning in effect for tonight. I'll have to find some way to cover things up in the garden.

If it's feeling fall-like where you are too, here's a picture to help warm you. It's from dry, sunny Greece in the summer:

This picture was taken up on Acro-Corinth, the fortified hilltop above what was ancient Corinth. It was very hot and very sunny when we were there, and I hope my vacation pictures are enough to help keep me warm as we plunge ahead into the colder months.

That's my daughter in the picture, and it's one of my favorites from the whole trip.

In which I get lots of quality help with my leaf raking efforts

I began raking leaves in the backyard today. I had lots of help. Mostly of the, "I'll watch over this pile while you make another one," kind:

Leaf sentinels. I has dem:

The rest of the help had a little more energy. Maybe too much - you decide, I managed to film some of the hi-jinks. Here's a little clip:

At least someone had more dignity than to participate in all of that silly, knee-bent running around business:

The little gray cat in the video clip is the little kitten that my daughter brought home. She is about 5 months old now. In December she'll be old enough to be spayed. She already has an appointment.