After the frost

The first frost came in mid-October. It wasn't an early frost, but I was still surprised when I woke up one morning and everything was covered with tiny crystals of ice. I didn't think ahead enough to bring in the geraniums, harvest the mint, etc, but that's okay. There's plenty other things going on in life right now!

A few days ago I got a few pictures to document what still looks nice this time of year, even after a heavy frost.

johnny jump ups

scabiosa-- almost gave up on these when they crinkled up in the heat

peonies-- I love how these look with the changing leaves

the garden-- so much potential

alliums, left the seed heads on and love these

lavendar

roses

barberry, so pretty!

barberry

weigela, don't love this one; maybe replace it with a burning bush?

And here are a few views around the backyard.

walnuts

backyard view

backyard view

some of the mushroom logs; got a great harvest from these!

the hammock

We felt a little disappointed in the fall colors this year, but once a lot of the leaves had already fallen off, the bright colors finally showed up. We've already planted 3 tiny red maples in the backyard, and I think we'll put some more in to enhance the color around the house!

For now, Mike is installing wood floors inside, so the garden outside will have to wait. I did buy a bunch of bulbs, but haven't had enough warm days to encourage me out to plant them all. I also wanted to get some good deals on late Fall perennials, but never made it to the nursery. There's just not a lot of extra time when you work full time and have a little toddler to take care of!

Autumn Wonderful

 Happy Fall. Two weekends in a row of wonderful Fall weather. Last weekend was perfect, warm temperatures. We bought some bulbs, apples, and cider, and I planted some of the bulbs during the baby's naptime. Today we are having a perfect rainy day. Mike is putting down hardwood floors in my closet. Yes, my closet. We figured it was a good place to try his floor-laying skills before committing to doing the whole living room and kitchen.

I'm so thankful he is so talented at woodworking and handy kinds of things. Here he is building a new railing:

 It turned out really well. What I don't understand, is how he can have so many tools, but still needs a couple more "essential" tools for every new project. I don't see how there can be that many more essential tools left that he doesn't have! But at least he can't mind the very few scrapbooking tools I have. :)

a few tools

homemade router table

homemade little work stand

So while he works on the floor and the baby naps, I figured I'd put up a few pictures of this year's harvest. I looked back on my last couple of posts, and I put some pics up twice. Sorry about that. Clearly, blogging my garden is not a priority in my life right now!  I'm lucky if I even have time to garden. But I enjoy keeping track so I can remember how things went. So, here are a few pics:

green things

wild grapes- he turned these into jelly

tomatoes

tomatoes and mint

tomatoes- he canned a little salsa this year

strawberries- we got enough to freeze a few

perennial garden before we weeded it

perennial garden after mulching; Mike has since put in the border for it

Overall, the vegetable garden became a weed garden, but he and I are making plans how to make it more successful, and more our garden next year, since I want to have a say in how it's laid out, what the permanent fence looks like, etc. Hopefully we'll have a little more time now that things are getting settled in our home here. And I'm continuing to work on turning my little perennial garden into something beautiful.

Despite all the weeds, we're happy to have had the harvest that we did!