Autumn Reminiscences

Let's talk about Autumn shall we?

While driving down the expressway leaving for the weekend, my mind wanders as through the window each passing tree reminds me of the season. Leaves, swirling down to gravity's command, wearing the fading glory of their vibrant show. It is that time again. Fall, the season when all things beautiful come to an end in preparation for the depth of winter. My favorite season.

Some people love Spring, the time of awaken and new life; others prefer the hot, sticky steam of a Deep South Summer. Others thrill for the freeze and promise of overlying pure blankets of perfect white brilliance, and the smell of the hearth fire flavoring the painful breath of Winter. While each of the other seasons have their charms and I do enjoy them each in its turn, my heart ever longs for Autumn.

As a child I enjoyed the swish of the fallen leaves as we ran through the neatly raked piles, laughter bubbling up from a wellspring deep inside. The special perfume of Saturday afternoons, a concoction of camp fires, s'mores, popcorn, and crisp cool air sliding across the countryside always brings me back to simpler days: Friday night football games and Saturday night bonfires followed by Sunday afternoon rides leaf peeping from the back of my favorite horse.

I love mornings, when the fog hangs low over the creeks and valleys of the mountains which surround us. The sting of early chill in the air brings a tear to my eyes when walking the horses out for the day. Mid morning the first of the long sleeves are coming off, and by after lunch you can wander in the sunshine in short sleeves; laughing to yourself over the capricious nature of Fall weather.

Autumn also brings the memories of first love. The rush of attraction soon followed by the thrill of those early dates. My first love left in the fall, more than once actually. He was in the Air Force. It seemed we were always saying goodbye. Then came college and the rush of fraternity boys. Homecoming and formals, dances where the music always seemed to fit the mood and alcohol flowed. 

Change happens constantly, but in Fall the changes are spread across the spectrum of God's creatures. Not only are the trees wearing and shedding their brilliance, but the animals are in their element, preparing for the depths of hibernation. Squirrels scurry hither and yon, memory failing them in the endless search for their summer hiding places. The skies are filled with vast formations of birds, seeking the earth's compass to guide them to the safety and warmth of winter homes. By Autumn's end, the forests will be poised with an air of patience; waiting for the earth to tilt again and the lengthening of days.

So as the calendar winds down toward harvest's end and before we bar the doors and windows against the long night of winter, enjoy the fleeing beauty of Fall's glorious daylight. Partake of the fruits of the vines and the bounty of the fields. Autumn's Harvest is here. Enjoy the repast!

April Showers Bring a Lot of Mud

Helpful Hubby and I own property north of Atlanta. Over the winter, we removed about 6 acres of dead growth, overgrown privet, and vines too entangled to identify. The extra cold weather made the newly exposed ground hard as the ice in the creek, so mud wasn't an issue. But now the spring rains have come and all bets are off.

The mud is coming.

Now, don't get me wrong - I love rain. I love the smell of a spring rain, when the pollen vacates the air and the world has a sparkling new green blanket covering the dirt. But when you clear land of years of neglect and overgrowth, one is left with a shoe sucking viscous material with the strength of quicksand colored the same color as Effie's hair in  "The Hunger Games: Catching Fire"!

It grabs, it spreads, it stains; Red Georgia clay is the stuff of nightmares. In our long ago youth, Hubby and I used to enjoy spelunking. There are hundreds of small (and large) caves in the North Georgia area. Most are wet, which means you are on your belly crawling through the cold mud. We kept our clothes in a garbage bag. No sense dirtying up the washing machine, it will just stain your tub.

Gradually the grass will come in, and the mud will be a fading memory. But as long as we are Terra-forming it will return in abundance. So if a spring arrived and you don't hear from me, send the rescue squad. Chances are I am stuck up to my hips in red!

Chasing Away the Winter Blues

I suffer from the Winter Blues. You know, that feeling that everything will remain grey and damp forever and you stop shaving your legs because they are constantly hidden underneath wool and it's too cold to spend that much time in the shower anyway? When the Christmas decoration stay up until February just because they are colorful and give you hope that spring is a-comin'?

Or is that just me?

Once the holidays are over I often find myself staring at the sleeping Bermuda grass in my front yard while sipping my chai latte and wondering what the neighbors would do it I were to spray the whole darn thing with green paint. Then the sun sets again and I wonder how long it would take to send me over the edge if I lived in Alaska, which sends me to the Internet looking for warm vacation sites.

Don't get me wrong, I love snow as much as the next person. I love the way it snows down here. In one week you can go from ice storm and snow blizzard to shorts and flip flops. This time of year we get all four seasons in a standard ten to fifteen day rotation, and deciding on the day's attire usually requires the use of the Weather Channel and the National Weather Service website.

As we head into March, we still have at least one more snow event to come. How do I know this? Because the first lay on the ground for two days. The old wives' tale I was always told is you will receive as many snowfalls as the number of days the first lay on the ground. I know there are other tales and methods for determining this, some of which include actual science-y stuff but as for me, I'll stick with what I know.

So, with one channel on the remote tuned to the Olympics and the other the 24-hour radar site with up to the minute Doppler radar, I am off to attempt some writing. That is, unless I need to make an emergency trip to the grocery store for batteries, bread and milk.

Gotta be prepared for the next go round.

Tune In Next Week...

 

 

 

Next week I will be among the several hundred authors / bloggers participating in this Blog Hop. I must confess this is my first 'rodeo', so to speak. While I blog quite a bit and on a variety of subjects, this time I am joining others on a topic. I'm excited!

As I have often stated, opinions are personal and not everyone agrees with everyone else.  But that's what makes the world so interesting. Discussing and arguing, freely exchanging ideas, ah the possiblities are endless. But enough about that.

 

What do you love about Autumn and Fall? What does it remind you of? What about reading? Do you think it's a good subject to read? Well, as authors, we are always ready to share our Autumn stories and why we love snuggling in the cold. *wink* Starting on Friday and ending on Oct 22nd, over 200 Authors and Bloggers will share their favorite things about those sexy men we know and love.

And while we do that, we are EACH doing a giveaway. Yep. There will be over 200 giveaways on each blog hosted by that Author or Blogger.

But that's not all....

We have THREE grand prizes. You as a reader can go to EACH blog and comment with your email address and be entered to win. Yep, you can enter over 200 times!

Now what are those prizes?

1st Grand Prize: A Kindle Fire or Nook Tablet

2nd Grand Prize: A $50 Amazon or B&N Gift Card

3rd Grand Prize: A Swag Pack that contains 10+ paperbacks, ebooks, 50+ bookmarks, cover flats, magnets, pens, coffee cozies, and more!

Plus - each blogger will also be doing a drawing for their own give aways

Check back in on November 9th and let's hop around together!

Happy Halloween!!

Just a quick note with my thoughts on the current issues around the country:

1) - Hurricane Sandy - Truly a monster of a storm when you can be affected by the storm more than 1000 miles from the center of the storm. I am glad all my family and friends are safe, and my thoughts and prayers go out to those not as lucky. Having gone through more than a dozen hurricanes in my life, I am glad that another area of the country go socked for a change. (Not really - I hope everyone knows that is only a joke!)

2) - Election 2012 - I promised my family I wouldn't get on a soap box about the elections, so much as I would love to sound off I will only say this. Don't forget to vote. It is a right many people have died protecting. Do not use that right without being informed as to each candidate's positions.

3) - Halloween - I hope everyone has a safe and fun Halloween. The Charlie Brown special has been played, the pumpkin's have been extinguished and I took my grandson in  love out for his first trick or treat. He was dressed as a Transformer. It was magical.

Don't forget to join in on the Autumn's Harvest Blog Hop, sponsored by Carrie Ann's Blog Hops! Be sure to leave a comment to be entered into a drawing to win a $10 Amazon gift card from me, and entered to win the Grand Swag Prize through Carrie Ann. Dates for the hop are November 9th through November 12th.

Wait..What..Not Again!

As June progressed, I finally got all the turnip greens out of my garden, and it seemed things were well on their way to a fabulous summer. I peeled and chopped and canned zucchini and summer squash while dreams of mountains of beans, rivers of sweet peas and bushels of tomatoes danced him my head. Once again, Mother Nature had other plans.

That's right - we have another drought on our hands. Just as my corn was tasseling and the bean pods were plumping, the rains went away. For more than three weeks, not a drop fell from the heavens. When the grass starts crunching under your feet, then you know it's dry out there.

So, I harvested my cucumbers (apparently they like it hot!), and squash and monitored the damages. Both my helpful hubby and my father-in-law pronounced my garden dead on more than one occasion, only to see me harvest baskets of potential pickles. My corn popped inside the husks but the beans popped out in full force, leading to a basket so full I had to have my son carry it to the house.

At last I relented and pronounced the harvest done. Some seeds were extra prolific (Squash of all kinds, cucumbers, pole beans) while others never ever popped through (carrots, peppers, peas). But for what did come up I reaped gold.

My final tally for the first Reece garden is: 20 quarts of beans, 15 pints of pickles and pickle relish, 5 quarts of summer squash and onions, 10 pints of lemon honey jelly, 8 pints of zucchini pickles, and 3 quarts of pickled butternut squash. All in all not a bad haul.

The tomatoes came in slow and never in any great quantities, so I just shared them with friends and co-workers. We got 5 full grown pumpkins, which were ready by the end of July. I am saving mine for Halloween. The biggest failure was no watermelons. I love watermelon in the summer. This year I had to resort to grocery store melon. Boo.

I gathered seeds from all the produce that I could and I intend to try again next year. No winter garden, I'm not ready to fight another battle against turnip greens. No, we are going to plow, rake, plow, rake, and hope for cleaner dirt next spring. I had a lot of fun, recalled a lot of good times with my father, and I wouldn't trade a callous or twinge in my carpal tunnel for anything else. Good times from the simplest thing - a new memory to join the many from childhood.

Thanks for listening to my summer saga. It might not sound like all that much fun, but trust me. It was a blast.

Spring Showers Bring...Road Trips

Once the great Turnip Green disaster of 2012 was averted, I thought for sure my garden was on its way. Seedlings were popping up, squash and cucumber vines began sending out their first runners, and my pumpkins appeared to have been set into pure fertilizer. Visions of fresh vegetables danced through my head at night, and on Sunday mornings I couldn't wait to be on the road to measure the week's progress. Then - another crisis.

From Mother's Day until Father's Day, I was out of town. Not for business, not for fun, but for family issues. First, my 92 year old mother lives with my brother and his family. My sister-in-law was getting a well deserved break and would be gone for two weeks. Since my brother has odd hours (he's a doctor), my sister and I decided to split the assignment between the two of us. So for ten day I 'baby sat' my mother. It was wonderful.

I had always been a Daddy's girl,. My mother and I get along, but I'm a strange child (it says so in my baby book). Only when my dad died early did Mother and I finally come to a mutual place from which to base our adult relationship. When she could no longer drive herself around, my brother moved her into his house in South Carolina. It was the best thing (did I mention she is 92?) and we all agreed it was time, but afterward I discovered it hurt.

Spending ten days sitting with my mom, talking, working crossword puzzles, watching every game show on television, fixing her meals - it was glorious. For really the first time in my adult life we related and bonded and discussed past history which cannot be undone. When Memorial Day weekend rolled around and it was time to go home, I was so sad I didn't even listen to the radio the entire three hour drive. I wanted to just savor the moment.

Well, the next day I returned to my little slice of vegetable heaven, only to discover nothing had been done in 10 days. Okay, in gardening terms, ten days is an entire season. The weeds were taking over. I lost my carrots, my lettuce, my peppers, everything that wasn't a squash, pumpkin, cucumber or beans had simply been overwhelmed. For five hours I pulled and grunted and cursed (again) my city-slicker hubby, but as the sun began to sink over the horizon there was a semblance of order in my plot.

Then, less than a week later, my aunt died. Back out of town I go, knowing that when I returned there would be more weeds to wrangle, plus they were cutting hay that week. I prayed no one would run over the pumpkins, which by this time had already started to bloom. Returning six days later, I raced up the expressway only to discover - more zucchini and summer squash than Carter has Little Pills (obscure 60's reference - look it up!).

When I say zucchini, I mean green blimps! These monsters were at least 7 pounds a piece and as long as my arm. Nothing close to the grocery store zucchini. My first thought was: did I plant the wrong seeds? But then I looked at summer squash and they were enormous yellow pillows! You think I am kidding? One summer squash made a casserole that fed three people for four days! My hubby asked if I bought the seeds from some mutant source. They were huge and they didn't stop coming for weeks. Even my usually eager town friends were saying no thanks, we've had enough.

Harvesting everything that was ready took two extra large storage tubs from Wal Mart. After some more weeding (those turnip greens were stubborn little twits), I left knowing that upcoming weekend I would again be out of town - this time for a family wedding in Ohio!

Well, the gardening fun didn't stop there. Next time, we will discuss who knows more: my city boy husband, or me?

Spring Planting (Or Replanting?)

Once we decided to do a garden this year, the decision on what to plant was left up to me with hubby's stamp of approval. Corn, beans, peas, tomatoes, watermelons - all standard Georgia garden fare. With the ground prepared and the seeds ready we set out the rows and off to the races we went. All the squashes, beans, peas, melons, in three short hours we had seeded an area more than 1000 square feet. Happy and pleased with a job well done, we headed off for our first week of waiting.

Anxiously I watched the weather report, glad when radar showed rain heading in our general direction. The weekend took forever to come around again. Sunday morning arrived at last and I bounced in the car like a kid on the way to see Santa. Just when I could wait no more, we turned down the street, up the long winding driveway, then past the garden. I could see little green shoots beginning to poke through as we headed to the main house.

Church seemed to drag that morning, and lunch was forever. Just when I thought I would burst from anticipation, we arrived back at the farm. Changing into work clothes I race out to my little slice of heaven to find...

Turnip greens. That's right, turnip greens popping up all over my nicely plotted garden.

Imagine my surprise. Covering the entire garden, in my neat straight rows and in between, anywhere there was a spare inch of fertilized earth, were little turnip green leaves. Apparently the previous fall, for a winter garden, one of the helpers on my father-in-law's farm had planted turnips, harvested the greens but left the turnips themselves in the ground. With the warmer weather and the fertile spring rains, those little suckers just popped right out, heedless to the fact they are winter crops that cannot survive the hot Georgia summers.

So my first full Sunday as a gardener was spent identifying and pulling little turnip greens while trying to not pull up actual seedlings that were wanted. This is when I discovered what a non-outdoors man I married. He couldn't identify weeds from plants, didn't like having to pull so many wrong plants, and within 45 minutes had abandoned me completely to sit on the front porch drinking ice tea while I sweat and pulled and cursed turnips with my every fiber.

I was not amused.

Rain, Sunshine, Warm and Cold - Welcome to Georgia

Having lived in Georgia a majority of my life, I am never surprised by the weather. There is no true 'normal' when it comes to our weather, especially at this time of year. One day it is raining and 65 degrees and the breeze is from the South. Then the wind will blow harder from the North followed closed by sunshine and freezing temps. Take this pattern and repeat for three months and you have Georgia in the winter.

The only good part of winter here? It brings about a glorious spring. When the dogwoods pop out and the azaleas bloom and the breeze from the South bring a hint of warmer days to come there is not a place in the world I would rather be then here. Living for a while in South Florida, I grew inured to the blooming of flowers and the leaves on the trees. Then we were transferred to Atlanta.

We arrived here in the heart of summer, July I believe it was, so the heat and humidity were familiar. Then came fall and the glorious colors I had never experienced before. The crispness in the air and the smell of campfires competed with deep blue sky and a touch of chill in the air from the north. The winds began to blow again, removing the last of the now brown leaves from their perches and reminding us that winter would soon be here again.

Don't get me wrong. I love the beach. I love the touch of a tropical sun on my skin. But I love the change of seasons too, especially the way my city changes along with the seasons. I lived here and there and I've visited around and about but when push comes to shove, North Georgia is my home. Always.