Fall and Winter

It is getting cold too soon. The leaves are turning and some are falling already. There has been frost. There has also been enough rain to keep the farmers from harvesting. There was snow in Wisconsin where my relatives live and in South Dakota, Nebraska. That is just too close. IT is too soon also. I read yesterday the spiders are showing up indoors more now and that means a early winter. Also if you have lots of crickets it means lots of snow too. This could be a winter we will hate more than usual.

October Tomorrow

It will be the first day of October tomorrow. It is really looking like Fall now. Trees are turning and some trees are even beginning to lose their leaves. Think the lawn has been mowed for the last time now. The Mums are really blooming. We have had a couple frosts but they are hardy and keep blooming. I hope this isn't a long, cold, snowy winter ahead.

Fall is Here

It is definitely feeling like Fall now.  We had some unusually warm weather for a while.  You didn't know whether to put the furnace on in the morning or not as the nights got cold.  Then by late afternoon you had to turn on the air conditioner to cool off the house so you could get a good night's sleep.  Yesterday we had our first frost.  I decided it was time to start bringing in some of the bird feeders and rain gauge to be stored over the winter in the garage.  The neighbor mowed the lawn the other day and think it will probably be for the last time this year.  It has been unusual to get so much snow so early in South Dakota and that is just too close to Iowa.  The Almanac is saying a very harsh cold winter with lots of snow. I hope they are wrong.

Drought

We are really in a state of drought here.  I believe our lawn has been mowed twice this year and that was earlier in the year.  The corn and beans grew so fast this Spring and then they matured too quickly and now the farmers are combining earlier than ever.  We have had a couple hard frost and sounds like more to come this week.  We had above normal temperatures one week and below normal the next.  It was a very hot summer and the air conditioners doing double duty.  I wonder if the Winter is going to be an extra cold and snowy one.  I think the almanac says it will be mild and normal here, whatever that means.  They say if you don't like the weather here where we live, just wait a day and it will change.  That is about right.

The Falling Leaves

I think there is a song about the falling leaves and the end of summer. The leaves that were left on the trees are really falling today. We had a yellow leafed tree outside out kitchen window that has hung onto its leaves until now. Now the ground is completely covered in yellow leaves. My husband went out last week and mulched all the leaves and the lawn looked so green and nice and now it is just covered with leaves again. Well they will stay there now till Spring.

Foliage, Family and Fun

Guest post of the week by Roscoe Harris

Fall is always one of the most beautiful times of the year here in Pennsylvania. On the weekends, my husband and I like to spend the day out in the parks with our dog, Nunzio. We walk for miles along the Allegheny Bike Trail and take in the wonderful sights and scents of the changing foliage. Both avid photographers, we take hundreds of photos of ourselves, the dog, and the beauty of nature that surrounds us.

After a long hike, it's time to get home, scrub the dog's paws, and have a long soak in the hot tub. As we lay there in the bubbling water, we gaze up at the stars and listen to music, or talk softly about work, our plans for children soon, or our next home renovation project. When it's time for dinner, we usually make something quick, pop up a huge bowl of popcorn, and settle down on the couch for some satellite TV from bestchoicetv.com. We massage our sore muscles, go through the photos on the laptop, eat, and enjoy a movie or two. Fall is our 'together' season.

Mississippi River

We went over to the Mississippi River during the week and spent a few days checking out the beautiful trees. They have turned colors for fall, however, they were not as bright as they usually are. My husband says that is because they didn't get the frost that we did. We have beautiful trees right here at home. They are reds, yellows and a mixture of green and red. I love to see the trees that are turning red at the top and still very green at the bottom. They are gorgeous.

Fall is in the Air

The nights are getting crisp and cold. School has started and the football games are going full blast. We have several nephews who are playing in different towns in various positions. Tonight it started raining lightly but became quite wet about the time the games were ready to start. It gets pretty cold and wet sitting on those hard bleachers watching them play. We are getting just about old enough now to want to stay inside where it is warm and dry and find out how they did on the nightly news. It seems like yesterday though that they were toddlers playing around at our house on visits and now they are young men.