Shifting Toward Fall

The Thayns were still here on Monday and we decided to go on a little adventure. Tabor wanted to see some place nearby that he’d never seen before. He looked at a map and chose a lake over in Tioga County called Beechwood Lake. So the Thayns plus Miriam and I drove over there. It’s a very pretty lake in Clymer Township, out in the middle of forest and farmland. We got out and walked around. Tabor and Miriam did a bit of fishing, but didn’t catch anything. The children waded in the water and threw stones. It was a nice afternoon’s outing. The Thayns left for home that evening after dinner. It was great having them here for the weekend.

Beechwood Lake.

By the lake.

Bottle gentians growing by the lake.

Playing in the lake.

On Tuesday I spent the morning canning applesauce. The smell of cooking apples, like the smell of cooking tomatoes and relish, is an aroma that delights me at first until I grow tired of it after so many batches. It is a nostalgic smell that conjures up memories of late summer and early fall when the apples are ripe and we hurry to pick and process them, reveling in their abundance. That isn’t the case this year. These apples are not my apples, but they made beautiful sauce and they smelled wonderful. Hopefully next year we will have apples of our own again.

Applesauce.

That afternoon I helped Kurt hang beans. We planted a big row of dry beans and with the wet weather we’ve been having, the vines were starting to get moldy. Kurt thought the bean pods looked developed enough to pull up the vines and hang them to mature and dry out. We hung them on strings stretched across the front room of the farm house next door. I hope they dry out properly. It would be a shame to lose that crop.

I was in school from midweek on, which only left me the afternoons to do anything in the garden. On Wednesday after school I started to dig potatoes. I ordered some burlap sacks to store them in and they finally arrived. One row of potatoes almost fills a 50 lb sack. I might need to order more sacks. When Stacey got home later that afternoon, we picked a wagon load of tomatoes. They were in varying stages of ripeness. Hannah and I sorted through them and set them on the shelves on the back porch where we can keep and eye on them. Stacey and Hannah also picked raspberries. The raspberry season is just now starting to take off. I love raspberries. I’m saving every picking and freezing them to make jelly later in the fall.

Potatoes.

A wagon full of tomtoes.

Picking raspberries.

Tomatoes on the back porch.

My angel trumpet (Brugmansia) is blooming. I moved it into the greenhouse a few weeks ago to protect it from the wind. It is top-heavy and every gust of wind was knocking it over. The greenhouse is also warm and it likes heat. The flowers are very fragrant at night. I go out in the evenings sometimes and sit in the greenhouse to enjoy its company.

My angel trumpet in the greenhouse.

Thursday afternoon we started getting frost warnings via some of the weather services. I couldn’t believe it. When I got home from school it was sunny and 65°. I thought, surely they are wrong. At first it was just The National Weather Service, but by dinner time, The Weather Channel, WeatherBug, and AccuWeather had all issued frost advisories. I felt a wave of sadness run through me. It isn’t uncommon for us to get frost at this time of year, but it’s always a hard thing. Stacey and I went out and rigged a cover over as much of the pumpkin patch as we could. We picked a huge load of bell peppers and jalapeños and brought them into the woodshed. We picked every tomato that had even a little color on it. I brought all my potted plants onto the back porch. I closed the door to the greenhouse to protect the angel trumpet. I gave the parts of the garden I could reach with the hose a good soaking. Everything else was at the mercy of the weather and the weather here is not usually merciful. If the forecast says there’s even a slight a chance for frost, we will get it. I said a prayer for the garden’s sake before I went to bed.

The only blue areas on the map - right where we live, of course.

Our attempt to protect the pumpkin patch.

Saving peppers from the frost.

I was up several times in the night that night, checking the temperature, watching it drop. At 3:20 it was 36°. At 4:15 it was 34°. At 5:30, when it was finally time to get up and get going for the day, it was 33°, still one degree above freezing, one degree too warm for frost. But I took no comfort in that. My little weather station is in the garden 100 feet from the house. I suspected that out in the big garden, away from the houses and the trees where it is open to the sky, it was colder.

I went out at 6:15 to try and see Comet Nishimura. According to the articles I’d read, the comet was going to be visible just before dawn, rising in the east in the tail of the constellation Leo. I knew the sky was clear. Every time I was up during the night, I could see the bright stars shining. Armed with the star app I have on my phone, I bundled up and went out to the front of the big garden where I have an unobstructed view to the east. As I walked, I tried to assess any frost damage. There was a light frost on the grass, but that’s all I could tell. Unfortunately, I was not able to see the comet. My app showed that the backside of Leo was still below the horizon and the sky was already brightening to the point where I could only see a few stars – Orion glowing faintly, and the planets Jupiter and Venus.

No comet, but Venus in the center and Jupiter higher to the right and fainter.

When I got home from school that afternoon I did a more careful inspection of the gardens. All the gardens near the house, the long border, the raised bed garden, escaped frost damage. Out in the big garden, the tomatoes and peppers had survived, the beans got nipped, and all the parts of the pumpkin patch we couldn’t cover got hit hard. It could have been worse. I felt blessed.

Frost scorched pumpkin leaves.

Friday the weather services issued another frost warning for early Saturday morning, so I just left everything covered and said another prayer at bedtime that night. When I went out Saturday morning, I was happy to find it was another light frost. The tomatoes and peppers and flowerbeds were spared again. There’s no frost in the forecast for at least the next ten days.

All week long, as usual, I’ve had a song playing in my head, but this time it was not the usual sort of song. It wasn’t Bach, or a hymn, or a rock song from my teenage years. I actually couldn’t remember what it was called at first. I hummed it to Hannah and she looked it up online and we determined that it is the song Sleep Walk by Santo and Johnny Farina. It’s the one with the great steel guitar part in it. I don’t know when I last heard it or why it was stuck in my head. It was a number one song in 1959 so maybe it registered with me in my infancy. It’s a great song and I’ve had worse stuff lodged in my brain before.

Hannah and Miriam went down to the Thayn’s house for the weekend, so it’s just been me and Stacey at home. As is usual when that happens, the house has been quiet. When it’s just us, we move through the hours doing what we do, comfortable enough in our familiarity that we know who is doing what and we don’t need to fuss over anything – not that we fuss when the girls are home either. It seems strange to not have them here. Stacey and I were empty-nesters for a little while a few years ago when all the children were either married, at college, on missions, or living away. I have to say, I do like to have my children at home. Not that I don’t like spending time alone with my wife, but in our thirty-nine years of marriage, we’ve had a houseful of children for all but a few short stretches. It seems natural to have them here.

The reason Miriam and Hannah went down to the Thayn’s was to go with them to the Highland Festival in Ligonier. This is the third or fourth time they’ve gone. It’s a fun event celebrating all things Scottish. Rachel made plaid outfits for her girls and a kilt for Russell. From what they report, they had a great time.

Russell in his kilt.

Yesterday was a busy day here on the Compound. Saturdays usually are. In the morning I made our fourth batch of relish from ingredients Stacey ground up on Friday night. It is our final batch. There are no more cucumbers and four batches is enough. Later in the morning we went out to the Amish bulk food store to do some shopping. When we returned, Kurt and I trimmed the onions that have been curing out in the pavilion and bagged them up. While we were doing that, Stacey started a batch of tomato sauce. I helped her with the sauce while she peeled and sliced apples for the dehydrator and freeze-dryer. She also made a batch of sofrito, a paste made of peppers, garlic, onions, and cilantro, that she froze to use in the future to make spicy rice. Later in the afternoon, I went out and dug more potatoes. It was a beautiful day, warm and sunny, and it was a pleasure working through the day. The house was full of delicious smells all day. We accomplished a lot and it felt good.

I slept in a little this morning and after I’d bathed and was about to get dressed in my church clothes, I looked out the window and saw a spectacular sunrise was happening and I was missing it. So I quickly pulled on my work clothes and hurried outside. The sky was aflame with color. I crossed the yard and the meadow and went down to the beaver pond. I startled some geese by my rapid approach and they flew off honking into the east. I stood there at the pond and watched the brilliant sky. It was thrilling. I made my way back to the house through the big garden and along the edge of the orchard. When I got back to the house, I resumed dressing for church. What a wonderful way to begin a Sabbath day.

Sunrise this morning in the meadow.

Sunrise this morning at the beaver pond.

Sunrise this morning, heading home.

We had good meetings at church today. We had visitors from the stake as our speakers. Now we are home, just the two of us. Stacey is making lunch. I’m going out to take a pre-lunch stroll around the garden. After a very dramatic sunrise, the day has mellowed. There are high hazy clouds and golden sunlight and a very light cool breeze. There is the possibility of rain later this evening. Miriam and Hannah will be home sometime late this afternoon.

I’m leaving this Saturday to go to Utah for a few days. My son Geoffrey and his wife Joni bought a plane ticket for me to come out and visit them for a few days. It will be nice to spend some time with their family. I won’t be home until the 26th, so the Journal will be late next week.