We used to rake the fallen leaves into piles and drag them into the woods on tarps. Now the boys strap big noisy machines onto their backs and blow them into the woods.
While we ate wild rice and chicken soup afterwards last night we talked about how much work it was to rake them. I agree, this is so much better, but honestly I enjoyed the raking of them, too.
There is no other exact experience as raking leaves on a blue sky October day. Okay, I know it doesn’t require much of a skill set, but one does have to intend to finish the job even though it takes a few days. And there are many distractions along the way, as in any other tedious, boring task. If it rains, the piles you decided could wait till tomorrow are now wet and heavy. The obvious thing to do is to wait till they dry a bit which could then be another tomorrow. If the wind picks up the whole job could unravel back to square one, the leaves evenly distributed, as if you’d never begun.
So when and if by dint of a lot of sticking to it, I ended up with a clean lawn before snow fell, it was a great feeling. It looked nice, too. Mindless work, I suppose, but it proved I had pluck, at least. Our children didn’t give a hoot about that kind of pluck, I had to enjoy that all by myself. So now they come over and whisk the whole works into the woods in a little over an hour.
I’m going to have to face this music one of these days and figure out how to fix the jack on that key. It went dead. I’m afraid I was too lenient with a child pounding on the piano. One of the girls reminded me that I never allowed them to do that on the piano. Oh course, she’s right. I was a much meaner mom than I am as a Marmee.
If one of you knows how to tune the instrument and repair that key, and wants to, I’ll pay you to do it.
All fall decor is on sale right now. Come in to our Northwood store for your faux pumpkins and foliage for the porch and mantel.
And Christmas decor is ready for shopping. Hopefully you all want snowmen and manger scenes. And ornaments of all kinds: felt, wood cuts, bells, and more for your tree this year.
Most important of all the current chores are the saucing and pie filling making of two bushels of apples.
Seed saving is just fun stuff. A package of a hundred, beautiful, little envelopes came that I ordered, and it’s not enough. One of Lily’s girls saved seeds from their gardens last fall for those of us interested. Now this fall I can save those same kinds of seeds for my girls who are interested. Seems so simplistic and ordinary a task, but I can tell you now that it’s time consuming and even a little tedious. I know now that a poppy seed pod full of perfect seeds that rattle when you shake them isn’t ordinary. I wonder how many there are in each one, for there are many.
Mom sent raspberry plants to me from her north Idaho garden through snail mail. Jo says she will help me plant them tomorrow. Once the apple trees are mulched and the new raspberries too, I can put the garden to bed for winter. And prune the grape vine and cut back the spirea and honeysuckle bushes. Garden chores are never really done. One could have always planted more spring bulbs. Oh, and I must not forget to dig the gladiolus and the dalias.
I appreciate my fall work more than ever this year. Think how many people don’t get to, for running from war and the horrors thereof. What a privilege it is to slice each apple of a whole bushel one by one into the warm, spicy syrup prepared on my own stove in a peaceful, ordered kitchen. In the end, I’ll have quarts of pie filling stored in the pantry.
In the end, actually…we are all so rich! Have you thanked Him today?
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