First day home

Remember when I said the house was cold when I got home, and I'd be getting into a cold bed? The bed didn't warm up. I woke up in the middle of the night freezing. I found a heavy blanket to add to the bed and went back to sleep. I woke up toasty warm in the morning. It was hard to get out of the warm bed as the house was still on the cool side.

I had stuff to do so I didn't fire up the wood stove in the morning. I figured the sunlight and warming temperature outside would be enough to warm things up. I got in the shower. I forgot I had turned the hot water heater's thermostat down before I left for Washington. A cold shower was not what I needed this morning!

The overnight low temperature was 24 F. Combined with Monday night's low in the mid 20s F and my garden was done for the season. While my carrots, beets, parsnips and onions look okay, the remaining plants were withered and dead or near death.

The apples are all gone from the apple trees. No apples were on the ground as the yellowjackets and deer ate them. Certainly the deer as I noticed their handiwork on some of the garden plants.

Most of the leaves have fallen from the box elder trees and covered the ground.

I found that some of my garden produce - tomatoes, cantaloupe, and cabbage - had started to grow fuzz when I was away. While stored in the 45 F basement (in a cool house), the basement was apparently too moist. I tossed out a third of my produce. *argh!*

I rode uptown to get the mail that the post office held for me. It was nice to ride my bicycle after all this time away. I didn't have a sharp snap to my riding, but I was still able to maneuver quickly through the downtown traffic and even beat a few cars slowed by the traffic and stop lights.

When I got my mail at the post office I was surprised to find the nursery had sent me my replacement order. When I had asked them to not send the replacement items till Fall, they had sent me a card saying they would wait till Spring. Why the change... why now... don't know, I haven't opened the packages yet.

Now is not a good time to plant as the bareroot plants may try to start up. The growing season is not over, no matter that the overnight lows are below freezing. I'm not sure what I will do with the plants. Bob and Jan have extra pots - and want me to take them off their hands - and Bob recommends I put my plants in pots until next Spring and store the pots in my basement. Great. More stuff in the basement, and more work tending to the plants occasionally over Winter.

Today was a perfect Fall day: calm, sunny, warm with a dry, crisp edge to it.