Gleaning in fields of grace
My daughter, Hannah, came to visit on Saturday evening along with my sister and brother and their fiancé’s. We had dinner together and so many laughs!
When they are all grown up we don’t get to see them as often. It’s a special treat when we are able to get together.
Jack-o-lanterns are what’s happening around here.
We had a pumpkin party on Sunday evening. It was so much fun!
It was a very blustery day.
Last week I dug the rosemary out of the kitchen garden and potted it to overwinter indoors.
Our home smells lovely with it’s scent.
Cozy throws rest upon the loveseat and pillows tempt one to turn on the fire
And watch an old movie or take an afternoon cat nap…
Perhaps a cup of tea and some quiet reading.
Even the squirrels scurry about putting their homes in order
And readying things for the coming season.
~ I believe this is the little fellow who absconded with the little pumpkins
From my window boxes and now sits in the branches cleaning
His little paws with the Old North church steeple in the background.
November is only mid-Autumn yet by the end of the month
It begins to feel as if winter has already arrived.
It’s not entirely unusual to have at least a dusting of snow by Thanksgiving
And though I gaze with longing at those who gather around tables
Set on porches or in golden fields, I love when it snows at end of November
And all my loved ones are gathered close and warm.
Night falls early, fires are lit, lamps aglow.
These seem to be the best days of home keeping.
We are inside and less busy than in the warmer months.
By march we will all be clamoring to get out of doors
But November’s stormy days gather us in
round fresh made soups and home baked pies.
Dull November brings the blast
Then the leaves are whirling past
The good
the beautiful maple outside the kitchen window is all ablaze in yellow.
The fun
My family got together over the weekend and my mum didn’t want to take her apron off for the picture…so we all put on aprons.
the random
Joe invited me up to the rooftop deck on Thursday night. We put on our jackets and danced to Creedance Clearwater with a Panoramic view of old town Marblehead.
The light shines in the darkness
And the darkness has not overcome it
Last night we were all together. My sister and brother, myself, my mum, and my daughter, Hannah. My mum didn’t want to take her apron off for a picture so we all wore aprons.
Tomorrow morning my sister and her fiancé go to Dana Farber for an appointment to set up radiation treatment for her stage 4 colon cancer which has returned for the third time. The tumor on her sacrum is active again and they have found a spot on her iliac joint. She has spoken about time lines and palliative care.
But last night was for laughing.
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Pleasant
I have been thinking of a word for 2020 and I think I may have settled on Pleasant.
One pleasant day in October, sunflowers succumbed to the weight of their ripening seeds and bowed their heads to the leaf strewn ground.
~ ~ ~
Stop for a moment and notice the stillness all around you.
We may be bustling here and there, rushing about to finish our chores,
But a single leaf sings it’s entire symphony as part of the whole tree,
red, orange, yellow and glowing in the setting sun.
And then it dances in the air currents, twirling softly and silently to the ground…
Laying there in stillness, it’s pleasant task complete.
Who are we to say that our tasks are more important or matter more?
As for me, I will stop in a pleasant grove of an Autumn afternoon and pause for the gift
of a single falling leaf, grateful for a tree
That is generations older than me, and bigger than me, and perhaps,
In some ways, even wiser than me.
The evenings are getting earlier now. It truly feels like Autumn. We turn on the fire when we get home from work and even the cat settles in.
I went to the nursery in town over the weekend looking for some mums for the windowbox. They were completely sold out and they told me that everyone else in town was sold out as well! So I picked up some winterberry plants, some holly, and a few small white pumpkins. Just around the corner there was a lichen covered branch that had been blown down in a storm so I grabbed that and stuck some of it into the back and added lights. It looks so pretty.
I began to put our little kitchen herb garden to bed on Sunday. The Rosemary which got huge over the summer is now in a pot at the top of the back stairs and some of the parsley is potted on the kitchen table. The day started out cold but by afternoon it was a beautiful fall day.
Our cat, Tucker, has been all filled with love for me lately. When he was a kitten he always cuddled with me and then he switched over to cuddling with Joe. Now he is back to curling up with me while I read on the loveseat. He even puts his sweet little paw over my leg so I won’t go anywhere. Last night he met me at the door and I pet him right away. I walked away to go into the kitchen and he ran up behind me and patted my ankle as if to say, “wait, I’m not done with you petting me yet!”
This is a little grove of trees on the campus of the Montessori school where I work. Maria Montessori believed that children need to have access to the beautiful and natural outdoor world in order to grow and develop best. I couldn’t agree more.
Long ago when I had five teenagers in the house and no dishwasher
I came to terms with doing the dishes.
One morning I decided that doing dishes was going to be pleasant.
There were days back then when it felt like I did nothing but dishes…
So…I changed my mindset from it being a terrible experience to a pleasant experience.
I bought my favourite scented dish soap, I turned on some music, and I began the task.
These days it’s just Joe and I, for the most part, and we have a dishwasher.
I still find dishes a pleasant sensory experience…the smell of the dish soap,
The warmth of the water, the sights of the little town outside of the window,
Lovely music in the background, the simple joy of completing the task….
October Evening falls
Low light
Cascading upon us
even the cat has settled in.
There is one single windowbox at our house. It sits on the top of the railing that goes downstairs into the backyard.
All summer I had geranium in it and they grew so beautifully.
We can see out this back door from the living room and when I sit on the end of the bed to put my socks on in the morning I can see the reflection through the bathroom mirror. It looked so pretty.
I thought that it would be torn down when the staircase was replaced over the summer. But…they ran out of time and have decided it is best to wait for the spring before replacing the staircase. So we get to keep the window box for a while longer.
There are lights on the branches and now that it’s getting dark earlier they will be quite pretty lit up.
~What do you put in your window boxes? Or near your doorways?
I have winterberry and a type of holly with small white pumpkins. I also picked up a beautiful, lichen covered brand that had blown down from the neighbor’s house in a recent storm. I went to the nursery in town looking for mums but they were sold out. I got what they had and I am very happy with how it turned out.
a spirit of simplicity 