Collecting Black Walnuts

In the front yard we have a big beautiful Black Walnut Tree that has produced TONS of walnuts this year.

This isn't even half of them. I'll keep you posted as we go through the process of...well... processing them into edible nuts. I'm also excited to use them to make natural dyes to color the roving. I'll keep you posted on that as well.

Planting Garlic

 Zach and I planted garlic last night. Like a tulip bulb, we plant in fall so the garlic clove winters over, then sprouts in the early spring. We will harvest the bulbs late next summer/fall, and enjoy garlic greens in the spring.

I'm trying some Elephant Garlic here.

I went to our local nursery to buy garlic bulbs to plant, but they didn't have any. One of the nursery employees told me to just buy organic garlic from the farmers market. So that's what I did. 

 I broke up the head into individual cloves.

 Some of them were already sprouting.

The nursery man told me that a good friend to garlic is Phosphate, a naturally occurring substance that helps root development. Gonna give a it a try as I've never had great success with my garlic cloves forming full heads.  

The garlic patch is nested in with our hardy Mums that we adopted when we bought the place. 

Following the Harvest Moon

September and October are always exciting times when it comes to astrology. Perhaps there is no time in the moon's cycle that is more attributed to myth, legend and folklore than the full moon. The effect of the full moon has created a stir for thousands of years, and not just concerning werewolves. Even today the monthly occurance is acredited with increasing fertility and inducing births.

This September was an especially exciting full moon as it landed on the Autumnal Equinox. There is a myth going around the internet that claims that if a full moon falls on the equinox that it will create a "Super Harvest Moon" and the moon will appear three times it's usual size. Zach and I always take pictures on the full moon in September and October, but this year I was sure to get out on September 23rd tripod in hand ready to capture this rare circumstance in astrology. And, of course, I was victim to the internet scam and though it was a beautiful moon, there was nothing abnormal about it.

This past Saturday was the October full moon. We usually go out the day before and after as well. The moon rises about 2o minutes later each evening throughout the Fall. In Michigan the sun sets so early that from Friday to Sunday, we took pictures ranging from daylight to sunset to nighttime at each rise. I always like to be ready as the moon crests the horizon because it is usually that awesome orange color. The moon at the horizon also appears larger to the naked eye. There is much debate as to why this phenomenon occurs. Many say it is an optical illusion, a trick of our depth perception and that if you actually measure the moon it is the same size at the horizon as when it rises and turn white in the sky. Others say it's refracted light caused by the humidity in the atmosphere, that this acts like a giant lens magnifying the moon. Either way, it makes for one beautiful sight. "The Harvest Moon is so named as it is the full moon closest to the Equinox. because the light reflected from the moon's rays allowed farmers to work longer in the fields during the crucial time of the harvest." (paraphrased from the Farmer's Almanac check out this link for some other interesting Full Moon Names, like the Full Corn Moon, telling Native Americans when the corn was ready to harvest). To check rise times in your area visit Moon Rise Calculator.

Diehl's Orchard and Cider Mill

It's just not Autumn without making a trip (sometimes several) to Diehl's Cider Mill.

They are located on 1479 Ranch Rd in Holly, MI 48442-8668. It a great little place tucked back in the woods, on dirt roads where the gold and red trees hang over head like a canopy.

They have THE BEST cider and doughnuts around! (Even Ceddie thinks so, although he not a very selective critic.) Their doughnuts have a sugary crust that crunches open when you bite into them, then you get to the warm soft center, and their cider is deliciously sweet and tangy with lots of apple flavor. (I know that sounds like an obvious description of cider, but I've had cider that just sort of tastes blah!)

The best part of Diehl's is that you get to watch them make your cider and doughnuts. This is the doughnut machine that fries the doughnuts and flips them to get both sides.

They come shooting out all warm and toasty before they're dredges through massive amounts of delicious cinnamon and sugar.

Here is where they make the cider. (I apologize for the quality of the pictures, the process is behind a window that was splashed with cider.) They place a wooden frame down on top of a large plastic plate. Then they put a cloth down inside the frame. Then they fill the frame with ground apple pulp.

Then they fold the cloth up over the pulp and repeat the layers until they have a large stack.

When the stack is high enough, they roll the whole thing under a lift, and the stack is pressed upward against a stationary top, and all the apple cider is squeezed out.

Vintage Halloween

Halloween is a big deal around our house. And while I love all things Halloween, I would have to say that some of my favorite collectibles are our vintage ones. Most of the vintage items we have are reproductions, either we've made them to look old ourselves, or purchased them that way.

True Halloween antiques are extremely expensive. A lot of the materials used to make decorations back in the day were paper or cloth, which as antiques go, are high ticket items because they don't last the years.

You can find old children's costumes with paper masks on-line or in selective antique stores. These go for some big money because the material used was so cheap to begin with, to make the costume more affordable, so any that have made through the years void of moths, mice or just plain carelessness, are quite the find. There are some paper mache candy buckets and lanterns that I would love to get my hands on, but they start at around $100 for little ones, and go up from there.

So instead, we have quite a few things that only look old, but still give that old fashioned feel. These are Halloween Noisemakers. The pumpkin rattles, the witch zips around on a wind up contraption, and the bat rings like a bell.

We made this cat some years ago, I saw the face on a website that provides free vintage clip art. I simply re-drew the face on a piece of cardboard, cut it out painted it and glued it together with hot glue.

You don't have to be an artist to make an old fashion Halloween look-a-like, many of the faces and "art" were very basic and sort of crooked looking anyway.

We got these two pieces in Salem, there is a TON of vintage Halloween in Salem!

Another fun thing to collect are vintage postcards. You can find some of the real thing for relatively inexpensive. We have a few with writing still on them. This one is a reproduction from Salem.

This porcelain bowl has vintage postcard images all around the rim.

Another good thing to try when re-creating vintage holiday items is glitter. Especially if you can find that cool old glass glitter. We made this cat out of an oatmeal container.

Wild Wednesday, The White Tail Deer

So I guess, I can't say I don't have ulterior motives when writing this. Most people who know me well, know I have LOTS to say about this animal. So, for once I'm going to teeter from the soap box and keep it short, hopefully, without sounding too preachy. I'd just like to say, aren't they beautiful, and majestic, and peaceful, and graceful, oh yes...and ALIVE!
(Ok, so I guess I didn't step completely off.)  Happy Hunting season, hope none of you shoot yourself in the foot, that would be terrible!

Orchard Images

Blake's is booming this Fall. I felt like I was in the garden of Eden. These frosty purple beauties are prune plums.

The bushes of grape tomatoes were so full that the plants were falling over.

They have rows and rows.

They also have a beautiful assortment of peppers.

It was a beautiful day.

Orchard Images, The Pumpkins are Ready

There is something magical about a pumpkin patch. Pumpkins have a human quality to them, they have personalities. I'm not sure if it's the fleshy, globular characteristics, or maybe in the back of our minds there is the ever present suggestive fact that we've carved faces into them every Halloween, but they are encompassing and somehow warmly comforting.