Goodbye October! Goodbye Daylight Savings Time! I’ll miss you both. I spent this last week of one of my favorite months trying to capture some good fall images. Images that would remind me of rushing out to water the plants before darkness falls, the last of the crickets’ song, the brilliant blue skies, the trees suddenly fiery red and orange in Knights Park (circling it umpteen times taking the kids to school, to friends’ houses). The bean vines turning purple and brown, the strawberry leaves turning red. My neighbors’ surplus mums and hay bales from their wedding in the park. My garden gate. Warm days and chilly nights. If only I could have gotten a picture of the big buck crossing Bettlewood Avenue in front of us one night, leaving Madrigals practice, as it galloped toward Newton Lake.
I feel lucky that I can keep myself amused with cheap hobbies like phone photography, blogging, making wreaths out of dead stuff (see below), and general daydreaming, because, as this NYT interactive essay describes, life continues to get more expensive and other forms of entertainment (like going to the movies) are increasingly out of reach.
Still, we press on, finding ways to make this economy work.
Right before my work trip, I managed to score a bunch of free rocks to use to line my side garden. This was through the Suburban Jungle Facebook page. N. helped me load the car with them.
For Halloween, N and F made their own costumes using thrift store finds, and they came out really well.
I am going to start using my phone to play white noise at night, rather than run the fan setting on the AC unit, to save a little money (and will advise everyone else to do the same). And some of the ACs need to come out of the windows.
I made sure to get over to DSW yesterday to return the two pairs of shoes I bought for the work trip but didn’t like (60 day return window).
On Tuesday night I roasted and froze tomatoes, and I still have more to go!
I was off on Friday to get my mammogram. After basically losing two weekends to traveling, I really needed this three-day weekend. After the scan, I stopped at Springdale Farm and loaded up on baby carrots, Macintosh and honeycrisp apples, chicken pot pie, mushroom ravioli, iceberg lettuce, bananas, apple cider, a muffin, and Parmigiano Reggiano cheese. It smells so good in their bakery/market. One of my happy places for sure. I resisted buying decor although they had so much cool stuff.
It was just great to have time to relax, walk the dog, enjoy the weather and poke around the garden. The broccoli and Brussels sprouts are coming back, after being eaten nearly to nubs earlier. Hopeful that they can produce something this month! I also separated them into other planters. And the turnips look so cool; I love their plump purple globes popping out of the soil! I think I will leave those and the carrots in the ground til we’ve had a few more good frosts.
Yesterday was Halloween. I gave out candy from 1:30 to 4 before I ran out.
In between bursts of trick-or-treaters, I started trying to dig up the oregano from the side garden, and also pulled out a lot of the bean vines, and started fooling with them, eventually producing this wreath plus a sort of Goth dead bouquet of oregano seed heads and leaves.
Not sure if the vines I used were too green; hopefully everything dries up properly. I may add more vines to the wreath.
Today I wanted to go to Hammonton to buy blueberry bushes, but it may not happen. Tom is sick, we need groceries, etc.
Meals this week:
Sunday: Chickie and Pete’s, straight from picking me up at the airport
Monday: sauteed green beans from the garden plus Korean dumplings from the freezer
Tuesday: light bites at Mulligan’s restaurant for me and Tom (crab bisque, yum) and Wawa for the kids
Wednesday: Amy’s brand cheese enchiladas, and steamed broccoli and a grilled cheese for F
Thursday: Ellio’s pizza for me, not sure what others had
Friday: Springdale Farm chicken pot pie, egg noodles, steamed broccoli
Saturday: the Fish (local bar) for me and Tom
Yes, a lot of eating out, but I was trying to get used to being at home and not having a wonderful buffet for every meal like we did at the meeting. Back on track today!
P.S. On the way to DSW, the younger two and I had lunch at Panera (well, they did and I ate their leftovers). It was fun; they were telling me about some of their teachers and debating which are the best AP classes to take. On the way there, they were fighting over control of the radio (the aux, to play music from their phones), and it was just like the old days when they would fight over who got to turn the page while reading together at night or who got to ride in the umbrella stroller. As N said, “Some things never change.”
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