Monday, October 18, 2010

This was our adventure....

Sunday, we went to the Open House of Dan's aunt and uncle. They built a house this year and are finally settled in and wanted a chance to show all the people who have stopped in along the way, what it looks like all done.... In my missing mom post, I said that I saw Linda. I asked Linda if she grew pumpkins this year and she said she had lots if I wanted some. So, after we left the party (had to wait for Katie to finish polishing the little girls nails some wild colors!!) , I started to go home, then remembered the pumpkins and turned around. Dennis and Linda live just around the country corner. We drove up and...NO PUMPKINS out by the road, so we saw Dennis and drove in the driveway and started yelling to him "where are the pumpkins out by the road??" They were all gone, but just walk around the yard and grab some from under the tree or by that bench or in that garden. Katie got one and I got 2 - one for Bert and one for Dan or Andrea... whoever gets to it. But it was a package deal, so we had to take some gourds, but that was fine, because except for Christmas, I'm not very good at decking out my mantle... and then we got some apples from the woodshed - some for pies and some for sauce...
Then we had to go check this shed out and it had Ida Reds in it for eating...they will need moved to the basement before it gets too cold. They are in here keeping the lawnmower company for now. This is Donna and the first apple she ever picked right off a tree. She grew up in Georgia, so maybe she's more of a peach girl... We went with Dennis over to Linda's patch of bittersweet, so that he could cut some of that, too. He was telling about these 2 apple trees side by side. One had gotten late frost and had hardly any apples this year, but it had protected the next tree and that one had already given up at least 5 bushels of apples. That was when Donna asked if she could pick an apple from the tree, because she never had. We decided it might have something to do with the fact that she is pretty short !
So, we spent a few more minutes admiring the bounty of the garden and swapping info and talking about tomatoes and potatoes and sunflowers and stuff.
Then we packed it up in the back of the Blue Traverse and headed over Cabbage Hill to home. Katie and Donna had done a Breast Cancer walk that morning, so I'm thinking NAP was next on their list, but Donna had some apples, gourds and a pumpkin to show for her visit. And here's my haul...

Dennis was remarking about how glad he was we were taking the dirty pumpkins and gourds, so he didn't have to clean them all up. The pumpkins got rained on today, so they are pretty good, and the gourds got a bath in the sink last night, so I could be creative....
And now my mantle looks all festive and seasonal and lovely. Thanks to bumping into some friends with some stuff...

4 comments:

Kim said...

The mantle looks good! What are the branches with the little orange things on them?

Karen Sue said...

Kim - That's Linda's bittersweet. It grows viney. He just clipped some pieces for me. She said originally she bought 2 and didn't think they were doing well, so she bought 10 more plants!! Now she has enough! As they dry, the 'berry' will pop open and the inside orange will show and the yellow skins kind of just be open, almost like petals. Most of them were just yellow balls yesterday when I brought them in.

Susan Anderson said...

Your mantle looks perfect!

=)

Leigh, Andrea Leigh Gil said...

Great job on the mantel!