Taking Summer Down

Summer sang its last song weeks ago, but we weren't quite ready to say good bye.  "We" as in the garden and me.  I was still picking a few tomatoes and the vines had lots of small green ones.  I can never beat to tear down the garden until we are well and truly done.  Tuesday night will bring a hard freeze and so today, Bell and I started taking down the garden.

We only got the tomatoes vines pulled up and detangled from their cages, but over the next few weeks we will find time when Jack is home to pull up the cages and remove the wires holding them upright. Still, just this giant pile of vines was progress.  I found my first horn worm of the season today - I hate to kill them because they are so beautiful, but they are death to a tomato patch.  Not quite ready to think about winter, we planted some bulbs for spring and watered the fruit trees.  Somehow, this led to playing in the mud in November.

Last fall, we threw the birdhouse gourd that didn't mature over the fence into the Cat Kingdom.  At the end of summer Jack discovered that there was quite a birdhouse gourd patch growing back there.  They never got watered but they flourished.  Oddly enough, the grasshoppers left them alone even though the gourds we planted in the yard were devoured.

Bella and I trooped out with a basket and pruners and came back with several good sized gourds.  Now they just have to dry for a few months.  While we were across the fence, we walked on down below the lake and pulled down armloads of grapevines for fall wreaths.  Bell had never pulled down grapevines before.  Some were too big, as fat as my arm, but even the skinny ones went all the way to the tops of the oaks and elms.  Now they are piled on the picnic table since it got dark before we could shape them.

It was gorgeous out today, but Tuesday will be in the 40s.  I am not yet ready for the cold.  For today, I will be thankful for my outdoor girl who tagged along by my side as we did fall things.