Originally Posted by Edie

The Cicadas are singin' away, you can sort of feel the Autumn in the air and yes, we heard that Minnesota is going to be worse than last year. Mercy!!!!!!!!

I get this "thing" in August and September. We call it the squirreling thing! We start collecting food for the freezer or the cupboard for the long cold winters, my sister is in Wisconsin and she is freezing peppers and salsa that she has made. I am waiting for my Sweet Dumpling squash to get ready to pick. I have a "cat pantry" in the basement where it is nice and cool and that is where I keep my squash, potatoes and other veggies I can carry over for part of the winter.

My main problem now is who am I going to get to do my shoveling. My husband was the world's best shoveler and I learned from him to do it right (yes, there is a right way to shovel snow) and no one else can do it like my husband did or I do and I just can't shovel the deep snows anymore. I-2 inches is fine, but heavy wet snow is out of the question. I am kind of looking forward to winter, but not the cold and the snow. I am going to miss my new deck and my rocking chairs out there to sit and sew, but I'll do that inside for five months. I want to do a little traveling before the white stuff comes. Oh yah - I was watching the squirrels in the pin oak on the boulevard and they are stripping the leaves off and picking the acorns off the tree and leaving the shells for us to clean up. Hard on dogs feet. But I am 'specting that they realize that there may be an early winter.

I remember the WINTER OF 1992 (you have to say that with a loud deep voice) when it snowed on Hallowe'en and didn't stop until Easter. We had snow to the top of our clothesline pole. Not a fun winter - but you should have seen all the Hallowe'en candy when all the snow melted!!!!!! That whole winter was sort of reminiscent of Little House on the Prairie when Pa had a rope tied from the house to the barn so they didn't get lost in a Minnesota winter!!!!!!! Well, we all talk like this during September and October - we survive the snow and the shoveling and we say "This is the worst winter we have ever had. I had never in my life (76 years) seen a Luna Moth caterpillar and this year have seen two of them, collected one and it is cocooned out on the porch and as it gets colder, I will put it in the fridge and it should burst from the cocoon this coming Spring.

We will find something on TV like Survivor or something to look forward to that will take us through December, and then the Super Bowl and then seed picking out for Spring plantings and before you know it, we will be there again. All wide-eyed and bushy-tailed because we made it through another winter.

I have a little poem here; I have it tacked to my desk and I just love it:

"I meant to do my work today --
but a brown bird sang in the apple tree,
and a butterfly flitted across the field,
and all the leaves were calling me,
and the wind went sighing over the land,
tossing the grasses to and fro,
and a rainbow held out its shining hand -
so what could I do but laugh and go."
Richard LeGalllienne

So, I guess, we make hay while the sun shines,eh? - High in the upper 80's today...........Edie