❤️ Of the Home - October

❤️ of the Home - September

Simple Abundance - October

Simple Abundance

If I could pick only one favorite month of the year I'd have to choose October.  I'm sure it has to do with the vivid colors this time of year.  Spring's colors are certainly lovely, but the colors are more pastel except for an occasional bright red tulip🌷or deep yellow daffodil.   I can see myself in Anne Mary Lawler's description of October "dressing in flame and gold like a woman afraid of growing old."  I've always loved color and tend to buy colorful clothing, but as I grow older I find that colors speak to me even more.

This month Sarah Ban Breathnach's Joyful Simplicities from "Simple Abundance" include these possibilities. . . .

🍁     Plan an outing to a pumpkin patch of farmers' market.  Select the perfect jack-o-lantern, but get an assortment of smaller pumpkins on which to carve different designs🎃, like checkerboards, hearts, or the moon and stars.  Pie pumpkins are the perfect size for creating luminaries for steps or driveways, and midget pumpkins make charming votive candle holders for dinner tables.

🍁     Create a seasonal table.  Set aside one small space on which to arrange an autumnal still life:  wheat sheaves, pumpkins, gourds, Indian corn, or bittersweet, with bouquets of dried flowers and preserved autumn leaves.

🍁     If you live in a four-season climate, take a Sunday drive in the country to revel in Mother Nature's flamboyant fancy dress.  Pack a picnic.  Linger as long as you can.

🍁     Mull cider and/or wine on the weekends for an autumn cup of cheer, especially delightful after raking leaves!

For years I planned an autumn get-away for my family during the long Columbus Day weekend.  The boys loved hiking in the woods and following the trails to hidden water falls.  Now that it's just the two of us our choices of when and where to go and where to stay have opened up considerably.  The world-wide web has certainly helped facilitate finding wonderful places.  Here are some we've been to. . . .

Eagles Mere, PA

Glenlaurel Inn, Ohio

New Castle, DE

Skyline Drive, VA

Western Maryland

World's End State Park, PA

Little Grand Canyon, PA

I also love decorating my house for Autumn.  I even change my dining room curtains from blue to red and summer paintings to autumn scenes. . . .

It is also a time to change my menu.  Now I'll make Sausage-Bean Chowder with pumpernickel bread, Meatloaf with acorn squash and baked potato, Beef Brisket with mashed potatoes and brussels sprouts, Chili with crackers and butter, Sauerkraut and Pork with potato pancakes and peas, Beef Stew with corn bread, to name a few--all dishes I haven't had in months!

What about you?  What delights you about Autumn?  Do you change your decor?  Go "leaf peeping" (as it's called in my part of the country)?

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Take Joy!

The Joy of Gardening

If you are a gardener and live where there are four seasons, you're probably like me in February--itching to get your hands in dirt.  Along about now I find myself longing for color.  It helps if there is snow on the ground to cover all the brown, but after a while that doesn't even help.  So this morning I found myself looking through my Photo Library where I collect the photos I've taken of my garden through the years. . . .
I planted my first garden when my youngest was two.  He would be my last child and I knew that nurturing a garden would help me let go of my children as they grew up and left home.  Over the last 26 years I've dug, and hauled, and planted, and weeded.  I've enjoyed walking through others' gardens to get ideas and perusing garden centers for plants.  Each year I look forward to Spring when the perennials begin to poke through the earth again.  I'm eager to discover what has made it through the winter.  Some do not survive, but this gives me an opportunity to start over.

Designing my garden beds is intuitional for me.  This is the part of gardening I love the most.  It allows me to express my own sense of beauty--putting textures and colors together.  But, like life, gardening has it's struggles.  Sometimes it can be disheartening when after a beautiful Spring, Summer brings heat and humidity to decimate my garden.  Colors fade, leaves shrivel, then the bugs and powdery mildew have a field day!

This is why I take photos.  They remind me, like memories, of the best part of gardening and give me hope for Springtime. . . .

                      

For best viewing, click right corner for full-screen

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Take Joy!

October Celebrations

♫Scarborough Fair♫

October, in Mary Mason Campbell's book, The New England Butt'ry Shelf Almanac, illustrated by  Tasha Tudor, includes stories about  Marigolds, Phoebes, and Sherman Pliny Fellows, a village blacksmith.  It also has Pumpkin recipes for Chiffon Pie, Custard, Fritters and Cookies. . .

This month in Tasha's A Time to Keep she celebrates Autumn by making apple cider and pumpkin moonshines. . . .

Click on photos to enlarge

Tasha's first book, Pumpkin Moonshine, was the first of her calico books.  Sylvie Ann's pumpkin ends up rolling down the hill, terrorizing everyone in its path.  But in the end Sylvie Ann gets her Pumpkin Moonshine. . . .

When my boys were still home we made jack-o-lanterns or pumpkin moonshines as Tasha called them. . . .

A few years ago I was feeling nostalgic and decided to invite my boys and spouses to a Pumpkin Carving Contest. . . .

We try to plan a weekend away in Autumn when the leaves have changed.  Sometimes we go hiking and other times we just drive along country roads.  Last year we visited the Endless Mountains region of Pennsylvania . . . .

This was my post about our trip last year:  Endless Mountains  We will be going up there again this month.  This time we've rented a house, and the whole family will be coming up.

All these activities bring me Joy because not only are all my senses being delighted by all there is to see, feel, smell, hear, and taste this time of year,  I'm also spending time with the people I love.  To top it off, I get to share it with all of you!

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Take Joy!