October-Fall Colors and a nice chill

Billy had to laugh about drying clothes indoors, when we first moved out into the middle of these fields, literally, we went to work and left the windows open on the trailer we lived in while building the house. Well it seemed that one particular windy day they harvested soy beans....OMG, you should of seen the trailer...lol One whole end of the trailer were windows in a bay shape... I think it took 2 weeks of cleaning nonstop to get rid of the soy bean trash....they just fill the air with 'stuff'. lol

Pepper that is great. It was so sad about the fire fighters.

I am shot, I had the whole day planned to bring in plants and it started out great, then dh got the brilliant idea to pour concrete all in front of the chicken house because of the muddy mess we had this spring. He wouldn't need any help....yeah right...lol He poured out 2 1/2 yards of concrete, WE just got done..lol. These chickens are living high on the land. lol

dh is helping me tomorrow!!! I did get these big guys in this morning before the chicken concrete. Repotting them was a real chore let alone dragging them back in. LOVE my big ee. The hibiscus is the one dh bought me a long time ago, I think I found a systemic from bayer for indoors that are tablets you push in the soil and it will fertilize and rid the hibiscus of the sucking scale. I am also going to use alcohol on the spots I can see. Since it is indoors I don't have to worry about bees and such.

This message was edited Oct 14, 2015 5:09 PM

happ - Lucky you with the garden room. I'm jealous!!!! The braided hibiscus is a grand size - WOW! So is your caladium.

Yes - You must have upscale chickens. I know how it is to get your free day planned for you at the last minute. I bet you were GREAT help. Nothing like working concrete. Just think - you can hop-scotch to gather the eggs. HUMMMM..............


Yes - very said about the firefighters.

I can just see her hop scotching and the chickens cocking their heads like what's mom up to now? LOL

Royals just won the game. We're going to World Series! :)))))

Love the recipe Pepper. Can't wait to try it. I have some sf cheesecake instant pudding, so I am going to substitute. Thanks!

Still feeling punky here. I'm only awake because Tucker needed out. Going back to sleep in a minute but wanted to comment on the gorgeous pictures, love,, love, love the Arbor and fence and the twisted hibiscus. I wish I had a garden room. I had no idea you could bring elephant ears in to overwinter. One year ago at this time a garden room would have been the furthest thing from my mind. What a difference a year makes.

I don' follow baseball, so I am only going to say congratulations to the Royals! I haven't been following the news because I'm already sick of politics, but I did hear about the firefighters. So horribly sad.

I don't know when we will be getting Frost, but I'm sure it's in the near future.

Does this mean the chickens have their own runway? I can see them doing the model strut as they exit the henhouse in the morning. ROTFL

Sorry, Pepper, the Royals need to beat Toronto in American League playoff before they go to World Series.

Thanks Bernie!! I missed that part. lol.

I am fortunate (maybe cause it feeds my addiction) I have two seperate places for plants in the winter. I have the solar room, our houses faces south and the south is glass floor to ceiling (good thing I don't have neighbors...rofl). Second spot is a separate place to keep plants and all my projects. That is where I will spend this winter. Only bad thing is the walk between the house and my garden room, the winds from the north can sometimes almost blow you over..

Still moving plants and digging ee's. DH is still working on the chicken house. I think we need to add lights and then the chickens and ducks can walk the runway strutting their stuff...lol

Don't forget the make-up booth as they!

So, do I sink this clay pot? Won't it break? It is the one the rose it is the one the roses is in.

UHM *GULP* GEE, WHERE HAVE i BEEN?? i NEED TO READ FOR A WEEK TO CATCH UP WITH YA ALL.. :d hugs TO YOU EVERYONE.. ( CAPTIVE AT WORK)
dEBRA

My tablet is doing really strange things. Sorry!

Happ, you should plant a wind break on the north side of the walk. Even bare twigs will break up the wind some so it's not quite as bad.

Happ: "I think we need to add lights and then the chickens and ducks can walk the runway strutting their stuff...lol"

Awesome idea!

I am terrified he is going to decide on central heat and air...rofl. He needs no more suggestions...lol Thank goodness he doesn't know about pinterest.

I wouldn't put a clay pot in the dirt over our winters, yes they will break. Do you have a plastic pot you can stick it in? Or you can just stick it in the ground and dig it up in the spring and plant it.

I was thinking you could sow them some cute clothes too. :~p

One of my two darling Demons chewed my charging cord so I probably won't be back on until I get a new one. This is the only charger I have and it works for both the phone and the tablet.
My Fridays are always packed so it will be Saturday at the very earliest before I can get one.

I thought it was this common sense to take it out of the house ceramic pot. I think I have a pot close to that same size. Thanks for the answer!

I'll be back when I'm back. Maybe by then I will have all of the plants in the ground. I think I only lack two plants – and then I'm done. Thank you everyone!

Joyce, here is my wind breaks.. not as pretty as your beautiful pergola arbor, but it works ..
and a couple of fall blooms other than the morning glorys..
Hi Bernie, Betty, Billy , Brenda and all those I missed. Ya'all made me hungry today with all the food recipe ideas, by the way, and all I had for lunch was orange jello with mandarin oranges that Joe made me.. :P
I wish I had a couple spaghetti squashes, I loved that stuff when I was in tween marriages, broke and hungry, with tomato sauce and cheese on top. YUM.
Uhm, I do not have my salvia planted yet, Pepper, and Joyce, those little voodoo things are going to bulbs now, u know they gonna eat themselves.. LOL

40°/51°/29°
Relative Humidity: 65%
Today...Sunny. Northwest wind 10 to 20 mph with gusts to around 25 mph.
Tonight...Mostly clear. Widespread frost through the night.Northwest wind 5 to 10 mph.

Pepper,
What a noble thing to do for the Firefighters.

Oh Happ!
I can't imagine the mess, but yeah, I can! We got smart over the years and open the windows on the opposite side of the wind, but it still gets in.
I convinced DH to put the front door storm on. He said, ''yeah, but how will we gather heat when it warms back up?" I said "are you even going to open the door with all the dirt?" He put it on :o) They haven't harvested the corn north of us and the wind has been from the north and west. Nichols Ag is just west of us. Non stop dirt! The door is on the west.
ROTFL!!! One saying I want on my headstone is "There's never a perfect day." The other is "There's never enough time in a day." Oh well, the weather will change and it will get done! Good thing is, it won't be a muddy mess and you will be glad for that.
BEAUTIFUL PLANTS and a BEAUTIFUL ROOM! So envious of that room!! Hopefully neither will need repotted for a few years :o)

Brenda,
Laughing over the hopscotch! How perfect tho!

Pepper,
Me too! LOL!!! Especially cocking their heads.

Patti,
Get better soon! Sorry you don't feel well, but going back to bed is the best medicine.
ROTFL again! A model runway! Perfect!

Happ,
Is there room to plant a wind row for the garden room walk? North winds are brutal! This will be the first year I won't have the arborvitaes to duck behind on my way to the garden.

Debra,
Laughing! This thread grows in one day, much less a week! Just jump on in :o)

Patti,
With all the auto correct, and such, I ignore a funny sentence :o)

Happ,
''Pintrest'' has me rolling on the floor again!!!

Pepper,
Oh my, I've never seen such fancy chickens in my life!

Debra,
I didn't realize we had so many B's here :o)
Now you are making ME hungry with the spagetti sauce and cheese.
NICE windbreak!
All pretty blooms!

What happened to Badcat? Did I miss something when I was gone?

I need to get on the buckets of apples in the garage. If DH would get the porch plastic up I would try the spiral peeler and corer to make dried apples.

I had to laugh. Thursday, we could have had scattered SPRINKLES!! That was the first time I ever read that! Naturally we didn't get a single drop.

Thursday, we came out of the grocery store and I saw geese higher than I've ever seen them before. I could just see them. It took DH a while to find them even tho I tried pointing and describing if they were in the clearing or against the clouds. They were finding their V so they really climbed after take off.

I picked all the pepper plants yesterday, and today we'll pick the Criterions. They make good breakfast food. I eat an apple first, then yogurt and soon it will be oatmeal. I did buy instant, but the flavorings put me off. I only tried it because it was high fiber.

Yesterday we brought bedding and a few toys in for the kids coming today. Even tho DH vacuumed out there on the porch the harvest dirt comes right thru the screens. The table just won't stay clean.

DD will bring the kids and stay for dinner before heading back home. Her husband is on nights. He works at the steel mill and he's in the melting room. Hot hot!

We haven't had the kids stay for a few weeks now. I imagine it will be non-stop noise, lol!

Have a great day!

Billy, you have apples? Oh I am so envious. Have fun with your Grandchildren, I KNOW your noise will be fun. :D

Morning all. I woke up to this roaring noise....it got so cold the furnace came on...lol It was set at 66. Since the leaves are still on the trees I am not getting much solar gain. Too cold to go out yet and the wind is blowing on top of that...still have things to finish. I put alot of them in my car trunk last night just in case I didn't get finished today.

Billyp, my husband retired from the airline and he told me years ago about all the bird strikes airliners had when flying at altitude, so geese can fly really high. What is amazing when I am outside at night and I hear them flying overhead and can't see them. Hard to look up afraid of what is coming down....lol

I hope next year I get with the vegetables. This time of year with Billyp and Betti all talking about their canning and eating I am like Henny Penny...rofl. I did grow spagetti squash but the chickens got most of it. One I didn't think they would of eaten it so they got it in the garden and got it before I realized what was happening. I grew it on a trellis so the ones up high were the only ones safe.

Went to a car show last night and it was really nice out. About 130 cars were there. They had the first replica of the back to the future deloran. If you remember right the date Oct 15, 2015 was the date in the movie...

Here is my rooster, he follows me around everywhere...lol We call him knot head, now you know if he had a mirror he would be preening those feathers nonstop... ;)

oh Joyce, u made me smile.. loved that movie wish I could have seen those cars. Love your rooster! Right now I am finding bird feathers everywhere out back, there is this orange cat that keeps coming back there, I wish he would get the mice, not the birds..
have not seen my hummer for two weeks now, I am sad..

happ- Love that rooster! We had one similar to that once and when he got all excited, he would shake all those head feathers.

I've picked the last of my 2015 green pole beans. Maybe I'll get around to canning them, and maybe I won't. I picked the peppers & green tomatoes the other day and have yet to make my relish. I must be getting L A Z Y. Yesterday I charged batteries for the drill so I could use the drill with the auger like bit to plant tulips, daff's, & allium. What was I thinking. I must have got piggy and bought too many tulips bulbs. I ran out of places to plant, with 4 bags to go. Thirty minutes after going to sleep last night, I woke to Charlie Horses in the back of both legs. Too much bending muscles that I don't normally use.

Our first frosting should be tonight and tomorrow night. There will go my zinnias. I best go pick armloads of blooms. I already have a big batch of blooms on the porch in a bucket and 4 bouquets in the house....................What's a person to do but grin and bear/bare it?

I need to be picking jalapeno peppers - there are bunches on the plants. I can at lease have pepper poppers come winter.

Best I get busy and be productive instead of just talking about it.

Brenda, ditto on 1/2 of what you said. Picking, lazy, sore calves, etc...

Nicole has the fire pit ready to light, Chloe is coming over, so it looks like we'll be outdoors snuggled around the fire this evening.

I hate it too when the hummers leave for mexico, I made water all the time for the hummers. Yes, getting cold here at nite too, I think 38 degrees last nite.

I have my water out for whatever animals need it tonight. The plants that are going to my friend's house next week are in the truck so they are less likely to get frost and will survive fine. There are some advantages to a black truck. Holds heat really, really well. lol

Really?? it's going to be that cold? BRRRRR
I am not ready! No No No!

32°/55°/31°
Relative Humidity: 74%
Today...Sunny. Widespread frost early in the morning. Northwest wind 5 to 10 mph.
Tonight...Clear. Areas of frost after midnight. Southwest wind 5 to 10 mph.

2 days after the Cicadas sang in July, we frosted. How cool is that?

Debra,
I do have apples! I have a Snow, or Famouse, Criterion, a new Jonathan and a new Red Gravenstein. I can't wait to see how the last two do. It will be a few years since we planted one last year and one this spring.

Oooh Happ,
You had a cold night! We set ours at 68°.
ROTFL!!! I have only been ''excreted'' on once in my life and it was just about 10 years ago.
To me even if you don't can, radish, fresh green beans, spinach, Kale, beets, etc. all good! Now I can't wait for next years garden.
That was a neat movie and the car show would be fun!
Beautiful rooster!! DD had a black Polish with a top notch. I called him cotton top. He was a freebie and so picked on. Poor thing.

Debra,
It is sad the cats take the birds. Here, they get rabbits. Big and small. I also find dead shrews.

Brenda,
I had to laugh. I was on the ladder picking apples and I looked over and saw pole beans dangling/. All yellowed because I pulled the rest earlier.
Try that oven roasting. Green beans are really good that way!
Oh man! Bad Charlie horses! Eat more magnesium!!
My neighbors plant a lot of tulips too. I just move a few bulbs that grow in the wrong place. I am not a good fall gardener. I hope the rest go fast for you :o)
I'll bet your bouquets are gorgeous!
I got lazy and sent a lot of jalapenos and green peppers home with my dad! Can we say I really planted a lop sided garden this year? Too many peppers! My brother will use them.

Betty,
That sounds like a nice plan, snuggling by the fire. Makes for good conversations.

Will,
Join the winter warriors! I froze too!

DD brought the kids and we had a nice dinner. Dad came up after and we had birthday cake. It was a good day.

Oldest grandson and I started out playing Chutes and Ladders and showing DGD how to count out her spaces. When her twin wanted to play he took my man and we showed him how to count. All was well. Then, he moves his man where he wants. I just started giggling and said let it go. Then she decided that was a better way to play so I told oldest grandson to hurry up and win and put us out of this misery. We were both cracking up by now with every move. They did the spinner pretty good tho. So, new rules to Chutes and Ladders.

Two grandkids were awake at 6:00, but everyone went back to sleep. I hear them now at 7:40 :o) Yep, all are up.

Good thing we turned the furnace on. I heard it run at 2:30 am and again at 3:00. It's still not warm which is why the kids stayed in bed, LOL!

Have a great day!

Haha! The winter warriors eh?! I drove a semi at 55 mph this week. That was easy but some of the other cdl exam driving stuff takes practice, a lot of it.
Oh, it's getting cold, it was 38 degrees last nite, and that's where I'm at in Springfield, Mo.

Just bought 25 bags of compost tonight. We have knocked the price down to $1.30 to get rid of it and since I need some for my veggie bed I snagged a truck full. lol. Tomorrow if I have time I will be ripping out the squash vine and dumping the soil in. Hopefully the squash bugs are dead otherwise I'm gonna need a bee suit so I don't have to worry about them landing on me. lol

A Burr . . . . 30 degrees here this morn. Lots of white stuff out there and not snow.

billyp - That was COOOL, frost in July. Enjoy those Grand's - they sure grow up fast.

Sounds like dry California is getting rain - did you see those pictures of the deep mud!!!! MY!

WOW - pepper - You hit the jackpot on the compost. Enjoyed your comment about the bee suit. I'm visualizing.

Time to run -must go free ice from the windshield first.

Have a wonderful day!

Will,
Actually, I don't feel so warriory. I feel whimpy.

Pepper,
ROTFL! It sounds like you cleaned them out!! You are so lucky to have it tho!
It's funny, Last week I kept seeing them, or something like them on the screens. I've never had that before. I didn't plant any squash so I hope most of them starved to death.

The birthday cake was a success and we had a good two days :o)

We let the twins play Go Fish and Crazy Eights with us. The youngest twin still cracks me up!! He has no grasp of anything we tell him. She does bettter, but I can tell she doesn't like the rules.

Have a peaceful Sunday.

Great pictures Billyp, what cuties! It is great you have room for everyone around the table. My DGD makes up the rules when we are playing games as we go....usually in her favor...lol We played jacks the last time she was here and she actually got the hang of it. Talk about eye hand coordination.

Oh Betti sitting around the fire last night I bet was fun. Just snuggled up, do you tell stories and roast stuff over the fire?

You guys cause me to learn soooo much. Betti made me think of girl scout camp and Kumbaya. So I looked up Kumbaya and what an interesting history that song has, bad thing is I can not get it out of my mind now...rof.... Then Billyp Friday made me look up high flying birds....did you know there is a bird that flys over Mt. Everest....wowzer!! Oh yeah I had to look up shrews...lol

I left the house at 6am yesterday and it was 42 and no frost....? I met up with friends and we went to Warsaw to the fall festival and went junking....(hitting every flea market and junk store we could find), we ate lots of junk at the festival, and walked a million miles. Had a great time, got home at 8:30 last night...wowzer. So I am like the rest of you L A Z Y today. Need to get with it I am teaching a class to the master gardeners about an above ground automatic watering garden. It is a rain gutter growing system, now instead of rain gutters they are using plastic pipe to help keep misquotes down, tho. That is what I am doing next year.

Must feel like sitting on top of the world in that big ole semi. lol. I am sure some of the things you have to do will take practice to say the least. Sounds like fun also.

Happ, diid you go to Heritage Days or just stay in town? Heritage Days has homemade apple butter and breads there. Awesome thing to go and see.

I was on top of the world! My tongue was hanging out, my eyes were bugging out and I had this big smile on my face! I was sure driving the heck out of that thing!

Yeap Pepper we went to Heritage Days but we didn't go up to the visitor center where they do the real old stuff. I enjoy that but since I was with other people majority rules...lol

I can see you now Will, rofl.

Got alot done today, windy but beautiful. I am doing the education portion of our meeting on 'hybrid rain gutter self-watering system'. I should be working on it now but...lol. I have the gutter system all set up and the grow bags ready, just need to complete the notes for the talk.

oh Happ. I wish I could see it. I can Imagine it, as I have read online enough about it, would work great under the t5 lights downstairs.
Will, I am so happy you are happy, you will have to take pics for us. So glad it didn't freeze for you up there, and Pepper, I should have Joe go get me compost , and maybe a forsythia if there are any..
Billy, you are the perfect Grandma. I can just hear those kids waking up, and man, I'd love some apple butter on a piece of toast right now. I'm also missing playing card and board games with young ones, so much fun you are having!
Betty, I love fireplaces, fires, camp fires , you name it. I havn't been around anything like that for years, now. I can smell the smoke smell in my mind with you.

Brenda, wish I could send some of our weather your way, dang!

This message was edited Oct 18, 2015 9:20 PM

Thanks Happ :o)
We can pull the table apart a tiny bit and DH made a board that would fit in and extend it. We didn't use it, but it makes that much difference for holidays. DD not staying for dinner and cake made more room, lol!
Laughing! Now you can look up deer mouse. We found a big dead one the cat left yesterday. Now that they are picking the fields the mice rush in like crazy! They look for a way in the house.
That is so cool! My neighbors joined Master Gardeners and do a lot of things too.
It sounds like you are on top of things! Pictures when you have it set up because I'm too busy to look it up.

Look out! Will is on a power trip! He masters the truck he can master anything!! Da da da DA!

Debra,
Aww thanks. When they all talk at once or argue, I don't always feel like #1 Grandma. I feel like Godzilla waiting to break out, tossing kids this way and that :o)

I think homemade chicken soup is my favorite, but boy did I make a good beef stew yesterday using our leftovers. I got tomato juice and stewed, out of the freezer from 2012. It sure hit the spot!

We will warm up today! We will also get blown around. I need to wash clothes, but I don't think I'll hang them out. I would have to put 10 clothespins on each sheet, seriously! We'll see.

I started sorting pictures on the E-drive yesterday. All the original folders are gone and it just has a file name now. The pictures are mixed up so I'm slowly moving them back to the computer and deleting as I go. Eventually I'll get everything on folders, renamed and returned. It's work, but it might be a good thing. I did have a bit of a mess before even tho I was trying to tidy up and put in order.

I got a kick out of the twins. They were reciting what they remember of their school's pledge of allegiance and the end was an emphatic ''SO HELP ME GOD!''

Have a good start to the week!

LOL Billy, that is so cute. Kids say the darndest things.

I have a program that is free I have been using for years for pictures, it lets me find folder immediately by allowing me to save as, rename, edit, sort crop and stuff. It is called Irfinview.
Sure helps me when I move pics off the hard drive to a thumb drive.

it is beautiful outside, but I am off to work.. have a great day.

Kids do say the darndest things! Hang in there billyp. Keep Godzilla caged. When those youngsters are gone, you guys will miss them big time. It will be too QUIET, then.

I've closed the canning kitchen. Just finished up canning the LAST of the green beans (thought I was done a canner ago). I made some awesome end of the garden relish and also made some green tomato mincemeat. I read where apple peeling and green tomatoes had some kind of nutrient in them that could help restore/preserve our muscles as we age. So I had saved my apple peelings from the apple peeler, when I made apple pie and I used them in the relish. What the heck!

I'm waiting on the temp to get a tad warmed before bearing the cold and doing some outside chores (digging the caladium bulbs, raking some leaves and fencing them into an area to cook them over winter with plastic (for planting tomatoes there next spring). Bringing in the spad birdhouses (below). New experiment with the cooking the leaves. Maybe I'll get-r-done and maybe won't. I'm sure I'll find plenty more to do while outside. Lunch is in the crockpot (stew meat with carrots/pots/onion bits), plus I made a bean salad earlier. As far as cooking I should be good for a day or two. I must not forget to wear my watch, or I'll get all side tracked outside and miss lunch - HA! Maybe I'll even pull some turnips for DH - he loves them.

Yum! Applebutter does sound yummy!

Oh - and I really don't know what COLD is, compared to what some of you have. And that wind can make it colder than cold. I'm thinking about that breezeway to the garden room area. Yes, you need a windbreak there for sure.............