dog thoughts

I was watching my dog sitting outside on the steps this morning. I love how he goes outside and sits on the steps in the morning and just watches life around him for a while. He watches the yard and looks around at the birds. Listens when he hears another dog bark. Relaxes again. I sometimes get the feeling he is taking a deep breath, looking around him and thinking, "This is good. This is just as it should be." Then he takes another deep breath and spends some more time just enjoying life, being in his space, basking in it. When he is done, he comes inside and is just as happy to see me as he was a half hour ago when we both first woke up. There's none of this "Hurry up and let me in I have stuff to do" with him whisking past me to get down to chewing his bone more quickly so that- what? So that he can get the bone chewed and be done with it, onto another bone? He is so much about the flow and process of the moment. Even when he is thinking ahead, it usually has to do with enjoying the moment again, anticipating something wonderful about to happen, like me taking the turkey out of the oven.

What I don't imagine him doing when he goes outside each morning is going out, taking a look around, acknowledging the beauty for a second and then moving onto thoughts like this, "I really need to get out here and rake those leaves. I really need to go check on the garden and see if the cats have got in there again. I really need to stop sitting around enjoying myself like this and go inside and start doing something..." But really, it's not the thoughts, it's the thinking we have to act on the thoughts- and now.

Fall really gets me thinking about the things that we busy ourselves with. It's the leaves, I think, that do it for me. All of that moving about of the leaves that goes on. My neighbor can be so vigilant about the leaves that at any given moment I can look at her yard and not see a single- not a single!- leaf out there. Then one will fall. Then another. Then she is out there in the rain with her raincoat on, raking up the leaves. Last year she came into our yard in the rain to rake up some of our leaves. She reminds me each time she sees me of the leaf pickup that happens every other week here in the fall. I know I would be frustrated with me if I were my neighbor. I am not what you would call vigilant about the leaves.

I don't mind doing some leaf raking. I enjoy the exercise and I like to get outside. It is the attention to minutiae leaf raking that gets to me, the toothbrush cleaning under the sink kind of cleaning, that we have all somehow signed this social contract that says, "And each leaf that falls from a tree limb shall be whisked away most immediately and permanently and forever shall the grass remain leaf-free. And we shall scorn you and blow leaves back onto thine own yard if thou doest not rake thine own leaves properly and respectfully."

I felt happy for my neighbor when I saw she had finally gotten herself a leaf blower this year. It seemed like just the thing for her and I could see her shy smile, her gentle pleasure at having this bit of glory strapped to her back. At last! And then I saw her blow the leaves from her yard over onto mine where they so clearly belong. Yep. That's what I thought too. And then I had to chuckle as the wind started blowing some of those same leaves back over onto her yard again. I was spellbound. Would she blow them back over again? Would that keep her busy for the next couple of weeks until the last remnants of leaves were finally banished from our vision until next spring when we will all rejoice at seeing the light green buds appear, happy to have our trees covered in leaves again. We will allow ourselves for just that moment to love the leaves as they are and then just like that we will remember that in the fall we are going to have to rake them all up again. And again. And again. Or not. Either way, it turns out, really is just fine. At least that is what my dog says.

transition

I spent quite a bit of time outside a few days ago doing a little fall clean-up, checking on the new plants in the garden, cutting down so many blackberry vines. Our landlord is coming over tomorrow to sign a new lease and I was hoping to take care of a few things before he comes over for his yearly inspection and it was also a good opportunity to get the yard cleaned up and ready for the leaves to falllll, for the annual raking. This year I am definitely raking the back yard as well as the front and now I can say it is ready. Maple, oak, apple, birch, let the leaves fall where they may.

While outside, Eva and I took some photos of the transitioning yard. I love this time of year for all of the amazing colors, the fall beauty just because, and the contrast between some of the summer flowers still in full bloom and the fall foliage found on the next tree over. It is simply stunning to behold and I am ga ga for Nature's show.







kale and sweet peas thriving, onions sprouting, all evidence that spring will come again, next year...

on lists

I have this desire lately to just post lists- lists of bugs seen, lists of fruit picked, lists of errands run, lists of games played by my kids, lists of music heard, books read, outings outed, fun had, being here and what that entails- as though the lists would speak for themselves and would need no explanation for understanding.

What would a list of bugs-seen really give you though? An idea of bugs in our backyard, the idea that we look at bugs, how we spend time down at bug level checking them out. How most days are filled at some point with some bug's life purpose and wondering about that. How Eva says "boo" to spiders in their webs and how the other day in traffic she said "boo" to the traffic to make it go away. (She said, if I can scare a spider in her web, I can certainly scare the traffic.) How it is spider season and the big ladies are out in full form right now and how I unfortunately have no camera {again}. Lost and bereft without my camera I am reduced to posting links to big ladies to give you an idea of their qualities- both their bigness and their ladyness. And here she is, our most famous big lady, the Cross Spider. We took flashlights out last night to check out some of the bigger spiders and the Cross Spiders are quite grand. There is one on the patio near the drying clothes and another one-even larger!- out front near the road with a third somewhat smaller but still impressive one behind her. Ah, to be outside on a September night with a flashlight and lots of spiders for viewing...

I look forward to it all year. That and the tomatoes. There isn't a much better time of year than this one right now.

signs of fall

The cooler weather has many people thinking about the upcoming fall, for better or worse, depending on your point of view. Or maybe no view? Maybe it is just is, and will be, eventually fall. There have been other signs of fall's approach. Yesterday morning while sitting outside for my morning meditation, I saw the first Canada geese flying overhead. It was a small group, nothing like the massive flocks that will eventually fly by, but a start nonetheless. The last couple of days I have also noticed a few trees here and there starting to turn- hints of the reds and oranges to come on a leaf or two or three. And today Eva pointed out that our blueberry bushes are starting to turn as well. Sure enough-it is that transitional time when you can still find a few berries left on the bushes right next to the newly turned red leaves.



There are still more than a few hot days left of summer to come. I am confident there will be plenty of sunny days to ripen the blackberries, heat up the tomatoes, take us back to the river, get us {finally} to the fountain. Fall is, after all, a transitional season, on the way to winter's plateau. Let's just say {for now} that the transition to the transition has officially begun.

As if in evidence of the push and pull of summer and autumn, yesterday we were filled up with both as we witnessed a double rainbow in the middle of a much needed downpour after spending some time at the upick- picking blackberries, of course. The blackberry is, after all, one of late summer's sweetest gifts.

We have spent the last couple of days visiting with my aunt from Virginia. We had Indian food- twice!- and took her to the arboretum, of course. We take everyone who visits us to the Arboretum at some point. We talked and talked and talked. And we did a little fabric painting on some t-shirts and napkins. I did not take any pictures of Mary Jane's visit, but I did get a picture of this crazy guy-



He is a Cecropia Moth Larva and he rolls over when you touch him. He looks like this when he grows up. As far as I can tell... He is a little over 2 inches long and quite thick- thicker than my index finger. He rolls when you touch him and it makes you wonder if that is how he gets around, rolling and rolling and rolling. It is also a little like a dog rolling over to be pet, but you get the impression from this guy that it is meant to be a deflection- roll and they will miss! Roll and they will get confused! Eva and I were enamored with his rolling, however, and probably spent a little more time loving him than he expected.

And these are the kids' fabric paintings-



Samuel painted a knight fighting a monster and Eva painted a prince and princess with their intuition.

We keep going places and I don't have my camera. We went to the Farmers Market yesterday and it is such a nice mix of tomatoes and squashes and apples. I bought apples and two chickens, one of which we ate yesterday (and a little more today). The kids had biscuits with huckleberry jam and cupcakes with very sweet frosting and I also bought these amazing dark chocolate covered hazelnuts because it is that time again, the time for hazelnuts.

Before the market, we took two giant bags of miscellaneous plastic and another big bag of plastic bags/plastic film to the plastic roundup. Samuel found a plastic case that he just had to have in the reuse section and now that is also in the garage. I am going to give it a little more time before I move it over into the recycling section {again- but this time for our family}. Our recycling company takes a larger variety of plastics now and I have my plastic roundup recycling down to just the miscellaneous, unlabeled plastics, which is nice and totally doable three or four times a year.

Today we stayed home and now that it is almost time for bed, I am wishing I had made more of an effort to get Eva out to the park or at least a walk because she is currently racing herself across the carpet on her knees alternately with swimming across the kitchen floor. She currently seems to have quite a bit more energy than I do. Hmmm...

Friday we went with a group of other home schoolers to the Columbia Slough classroom and learned about watersheds. Portland is one of two cities in the country that gets its water from a natural watershed source (hoping I got that fact straight). We also took a walk around Whitaker Pond, where the classroom is located, and saw signs of beavers! and frogs! and a whole berry-tree full of cedar waxwings! I am smitten with cedar waxwings after hearing their call for the first time while camping last summer. Lots of Red Alders and Black Cottonwoods.

After that we got Hotlips pizza and spent several hours at the park with our friends Nicole and Esme and Eva and Esme played and played and played. Earlier this week we spent time at another park with our friends Kate and Jack and Samuel and Jack played and played and played. Nice for me because I get to talk and talk and talk. Nice to be outside for a while during these fall days. We actually had hail on Thursday, along with quite a bit of rain. The weather was quite cold for Portland for the next two nights and it nearly froze. Today I found a garden spider inside the house, near the front door, looking for a reprieve from the cold I guess. I can't help but wonder if her luck will be as good in here as outside but I suppose she will go back outside if it isn't.

Aside from the Gravenstein apples we picked when we picked peaches in August and September, we didn't pick any apples this year. Today we went over to an apple orchard that we have picked apples at in the past and bought some apples and tomatoes and honey (from the guy who brings his bees to pollinate the apple blossoms in the spring). The best part was that they had lots and lots of Liberty apples! These are my favorite apples, particularly at this time of year and I really look forward to them.

Here are some Liberty and Jonagold apples. I got the Jonagolds for Samuel but as it turns out, he prefers the Liberties as well.

Notice also, purple hat knitting and striped dinosaur knitting. I took a break from dino-knitting to rip out a hat that was too large from last year that I never got around to.

I did some cool weather planting today and was excited to see that my patron saint Kale left some ferrel kale plants outside of the raised beds! I replanted some of them next to the little plants I bought at the coop. There should be kale this winter for sure!

While clearing out the space for the kale, taking out some dried up sweet peas and queen anne's lace (carrot flowers), I found the largest big lady (genus Araneus, she's a cross spider!) that I have seen yet this season. I have to say that if I had known I would be displacing her, I would have cleared out another area in the garden. She has such a short time here and I just love her luminescent webs in the sunshine and moonlight. I am hopeful she will find another space...

The kids have been on a Lilo and Stitch kick after Eva decided she wants to go to Hawaii. They ordered the first one and then there are two others that we found at the library. I have to say, I wasn't thrilled with the prospect of bringing Lilo and Stitch home when I first saw the cover of the video a couple of years ago, but it has since grown on me and I particularly love the end scenes in the original when the aliens and the social worker and Lilo and Stitch and her sister and her boyfriend all seem to have this lovely makeshift family. It is sweet and extremely funny.

Grandpa has come and gone and we had a lovely time visiting. He stayed a day extra this time and it was nice to have a quiet last day. Of course there was miniature golf and we took a walk at the Arboretum and ate pizza and Mexican food. Jack had daily morning walks and Samuel and Grandpa played many Shadow games with knights and legos and castles. Eva joined in some this time as well. There was a lot of checkers played and some chess and quite a bit of Uno and Go Fish.

Samuel's riding lessons have started back up after his teacher took a long family vacation over the summer. He is thrilled to be riding again and is trying to figure out how to get a horse of his own. We are going to a horse show tomorrow at the stables where he takes lessons to see some of the other people ride. Some of them are quite good and there are people of all ages and levels.

Today I made some more minestrone and some tomato dill soup- to eat and to freeze for winter. I still have a ton of tomatoes and I think I am just going to freeze them this year and not can any of them. After the peaches and pears, I am just not up for any more canning and I have my freezer in the garage that still has enough space in it for tomatoes.

I bought some kale plants and chard plants to put in the garden and can't wait until we start getting some more greens from our produce basket. I have been making lots and lots of tomato juice with my juicer- tomato and carrot and cucumber...

So that's how it is. Food and knitting and organizing. And really getting into the swing of fall. I love fall and really just cannot get enough of the clean air and the beauty of the changing leaves and the big clouds and changing sunshine to rain and back again. I miss my flip flops but have enjoyed putting on my fleece and sitting outside in the cooler air in the mornings.

then the talk

I made the Vegetable Chowder from the Moosewood Cookbook (always a favorite) last night. So good and a great way to use all of the different veggies from this time of year. I used potatoes (purple, red, fingerling), corn, broccoli, carrots, purple onion, cannellini beans and basil and sauted it all in butter and then added almond milk. The recipe calls for (cow's) milk and heavy cream, if you like.

I also made some basil pesto with walnuts and hazelnuts (to make it local and the mix of the two nuts made it really tasty) and froze some and then used some to mix with cannellini beans in the cuisinart to make a pesto bean dip. It is lovely with crackers and Charlie and I really enjoyed it. I have to say it is really fun to live with a rat because if everyone else snubs your food, the rat will always join you for dinner or lunch or a snack or whatever you've got. Every. Single. Time. He sits watching me now as I type and when I look over, he gives me the signal that he would be up for a snack right now!

Eva wants to make lasagna and we are going to pick tomatoes tomorrow in honor of the Autumn Equinox. Not sure if I am up for making lasagna tonight, although we stopped for ricotta cheese on the way home from errands today, so I am all set. It seems fitting to pick tomatoes and then make a lasagna in honor of the Equinox. Usually we pick apples on the Equinox but for some reason this year I am not really feeling like picking more fruit. We are still eating many many pears. I made apple pear sauce and that is a hit but I think I will wait a bit to pick apples. My tree out back is very prolific and this could also be a reason I don't feel like bringing more apples home! They aren't quite ripe, but when they do ripen it will be a bumper crop for sure.

Everyone is very excited and anticipating Grandpa's visit next week. Samuel was going over his plans for what we will eat when he visits. We are going to check out Flock and Fiber this year and see what that is all about. I am excited whenever I get to see a lot of yarn and the animals should be fun to see.

Samuel is also very excited about his new Bionicles he got this weekend. And did you know Lego now makes a jewelry/music box? Yes. And we now own the Lego fairy music box. Eva listened to it all the way through the mall and in the car on the way home. It plays twinkle twinkle. The music box is heart shaped and has a mirror inside and Eva said she just loves looking at herself in a heart shaped mirror. So cute.

The kids are watching Thumbelina right now and I am going to take this time to knit some of the dinosaurs I am planning on giving them for Christmas. My first T-rex is almost done! I don't know if Samuel will be surprised because he seems to be taking after me as far as being able to guess gifts, but Eva will be surprised for sure and I think they will both be excited to see these guys finally knit. I think we picked out the patterns last spring!

apples

Jumpin' Jupiters I nearly forgot...



I am so excited about all of the apples on our lovely apple tree. I put all of the fallen apples last fall around the base of the tree, thinking that the tree would be expecting this out in the wild more than it would be expecting me to pick them all up and put them in the compost pile. And would you believe the number of apples that are on the tree this year?! I had no idea! Fantastic!

transition

I blinked...





Autumn is on its way. Autumn is a type of transition in and of itself and then there is the autumn that is there when summer is no more. We have started the transition to autumn, the transition of autumn. Really, I have seen a few leaves in a few trees here and there, looking autumn-ish for a few days, weeks, now. Yesterday, I noticed for the first time the leaves on the blueberry bushes were changing color. There are still a few blueberries out there to pick, a half pint or a little bit more. I picked very thoroughly last week a few pints, up into the tops of the bushes. I found some wonderfully sweet blueberries and we finished them off yesterday. I love the contrast between the changing leaves and the last lingering blueberries.

Our bright red bush out front will soon be bright red again. It is one of the first changes to happen when the seasons move on.

Thanksgiving and then some

Leaf raking and playing on Thanksgiving.



Lot's of leaves!



Dive right in!



Samuel basting the turkey.



Eva and Katherine playing.



Everyone feasting; Alexandra at the table; Samuel and Evan playing a chess match against Danny.



I asked Eva about this photo and she said she was showing Katherine photos of pumpkins and Katherine was putting the baby in the CD player.



Samuel and Eva using hammers to break up the ice yesterday.



Samuel preparing for ice breaking today; some lovely photos he took of the oak leaves in the ice. Eva didn't join him today and he brought some icy leaves inside for her. They are now in our freezer. When we take them out to look at them, they melt a little and we put them back in the freezer quickly!



Eva said these are the Buddha's meditating among the flowers, which help them communicate when they are not talking to one another. The snakes can help with this as well.

Garden

Well, the garden is going strong. We have a ton of broccoli and the kale is amazing. And the radishes I planted when? are doing really well. Also carrots and let me tell you the borage has really made a home for itself out there. The sweet peas are getting ready to flower! I didn't know if it would work planting them when I did but it turns out you really can treat this time of year as a sort of second spring out here in the Pacific Northwest, which is a maritime climate. Unfortunately, the pumpkin that was orange-ing out there molded before it fully ripened. It is a good meal for the slugs at this point and still pretty out there in the garden among the many borage plants. I am pleased the plant was able to produce a pumpkin at all as it was the first pumpkin plant I have planted in recent memory.

Here are some lovely shots of the fall garden!



Here are the year old broccoli plants I planted last fall. They are very tall. They don't give large heads of broccoli any more, but all of the little heads add up to quite a bit of broccoli. More, actually, than a larger head might. Not sure what they will do through this winter. All of the heads are trying to flower right now, making a last ditch effort, perhaps, and some of the leaves are actually yellowing. Ah, the life of a broccoli plant!



Little broccoli heads. Borage flowers in the background.



Garden bounty.



Samuel's garden, complete with chard.



Kale!



Radishes popping out of the Earth.



Radishes.

seasons

What I like about the change of seasons is that they come on slowly. You notice small changes. Like one week there is no longer any zucchini in the produce basket. It begins to rain in earnest. They send green tomatoes and some cabbage and carrots show up and potatoes every week. Suddenly you need to find out what to do with two heads of broccoli and not six zucchini. Both go well with parmesan. The basil is gone but the marjoram still thrives. Thyme will last through winter, as will rosemary. I wonder why I haven't used any thyme for months except in tea and remember the cilantro- gone. No more swallows. Juncos appear. Geese circle 'round our neighborhood again. A bush out front turns red and the blueberry bushes turn red and orange and the oak across the street is glorious. Eva asks why I froze all of the berries and I point out they aren't growing anymore. Where did they go? Remember when the bushes were heavy with berries and we grabbed handfuls every time we went out front, every time we went anywhere in the car.

And then all of sudden it is fall. Our oak is bright red. Our maple is bright yellow. Driving down the street is a symphony of color. The next season is here! You are in it, in the process of the season. No longer wondering when fall will be here, remembering what that feels like, what that smells like. How the trees turn red and yellow and orange. But what RED and YELLOW and ORANGE. Nothing is like seeing it now, again, for the first time. The colors dulled in memory. Wondering about whether the rainfall determines the trees' colors like Grandma Spangler said. Knowing you can't double check, ever, if it was yellow in the rain or red. That is the other thing I like about the change of seasons. All of a sudden you are not in between two seasons, hot and cold, green and red, tomatoes and cabbage. You are in one and not the other. And then it starts again. Just when you are in one and not the other, you're moving into the next. No more persimmons. No more pomegranates. Satsumas! But that is for another time. In another month or two. For now, it is fall.

to market to market

Eva and Samuel



Eva and Tomatoes



Just Tomatoes



Wow! Have you ever seen so many tomatoes!



And Peppers!



And Flowers!