November Odds and Ends

J. has been busy this week sorting the clutter of our belongings which landed in the small garage when we moved here.  He took a break to clean the gutters on the west side of the house.

The weather has been a marvel of crispy evenings and frosty mornings, sunny afternoons.

This particular afternoon brought a spattering of rain and J. decided to clear out accumulated leaves before they packed into a soggy mass.

Work is nearing completion on the "family room" in the basement.

J. tiled the floor, troweled a spackle mixture on the two concrete block walls, which we painted in a soft yellow, labeled something like "oatlands gold." The color is deeper and richer than in the photo.

He has set some oddments of furniture here and there, but "decorating" as such remains to be done.

This color is also not true--it is a deeper russet with a brown tint.

J. finds renovations frustrating.

You can see that the line of the partition was not squarely built and he had no choice but to follow it when laying the ceramic tile.

Dartford Warbler posted lovely photos of her Liquid Amber tree.

As I viewed them the leaf shape seemed very familiar.

What a treat to find it is known here as Sweet Gum.

Ours has lost several branches during the summer; they simply crash down.

If you enlarge the photo you can clearly see the "gum balls" still clinging to the branches.

I eyed them yesterday with the thought that they could be gathered and hot-glued to a wreath--then reminded myself that merely bringing in a basket of them would encourage the cats to rattle them all over the house!

Delilah Yoder has been making traditional Amish candies

and presented us with a tub of peanut brittle and one of "buckeyes"--a peanut butter/confectioner's sugar ball which is dipped in melted chocolate.

Delilah is stocking huge sheets of  milk chocolate and white chocolate in her little store and reports that the Amish ladies of the neighborhood are buying the big blocks at a great rate.

If you imagine the size of a placemat, that's about the size of the chocolate blocks which are probably an inch and a half thick.

Grey branches of the maple during the afternoon shower.

On his last visit here Mr. Rogers presented us with a container of pecans from his trees.

He mentioned, with a twinkle, that a pecan pie wouldn't come amiss.

Knowing that Mr. R. must be careful [at age 94] of his sugar intake, I sampled a thin slice of the pie before J. delivered it.

I used locally made sorghum rather than dark corn syrup for the sweetner and was pleased with my tweaking of the recipe.

My big desk shares space with the guest room bed.

I nearly always have feline companions when I am working at the computer.

I spead an old quilt and a soft wool blanket for the comfort of the cats.

Here we have Chester, Teasel and Jemima.

Note the tangle of legs!

Teasel is looking a bit crowded as Mima stretches obliviously.

There was heavy frost early this morning and this patch of mint looked fresh and hardy.

Frost melts to fat water droplets on the leaves of sage.

This branch of nandina caught my eye with its shades of deep red and green.

The egg sacks left by my summer resident spider have darkened and shriveled in the weather.

One was whipped from the porch post by the wind and skittered across the porch.

I retreived it and dropped it into the clump of sedum which had hosted the spiders' webs.

I sat in the living room rocker this morning, hands wrapped around a warm mug enjoying the considerable gymnastics of

cardinals, bluejays [called "jaybirds" in Kentucky!] and the resident bluebirds, all bouncing through the branches of the still unidentified small tree below the front porch.

I wasn't the only one observing, as became apparent when the incorrigable Willis hoisted himself nimbly into the tree.

Pegging sheets on the line I noticed two tiny short-stemmed violets

blooming shyly.

Over the years they have spread into a mat which survives being mowed and walked upon.

Wildflowers at the end of November are indeed a blessing.