Wrapping things up

For the first time in what seems like months, we had some good weather. Outside we went, to start the fall clean-up process. It's kind of bittersweet, since it means the end of another growing season. But there's always next year!

It was time to say good bye to the farmette.

The flowerboxes were emptied,

as were most of the pots.

A few plants were salvaged for a few more weeks.

And the garden bunnies have started lining up in preparation for their winter stay in the garage.

Fall color

Every fall, there is one day when the color peaks and it seems that the color couldn't get any better. If we're lucky, and conditions are right, it may last a couple of days. Yesterday, when this picture was taken, was the day. Even though the sun was not out, the yard was absolutely aglow in brilliant yellow. Today, about third of the leaves are down, and it's downhill from here.

Can technology cure this problem?

In a recent fit of organizing fervor, I decided to put all the kids’ baby and school pictures in chronological order, with the "someday" goal of putting them into an album, all neatly labeled. It should have been an easy job, as they were already sorted out by child. Well, most of them were. Some were buried in the bottom of the plastic bin I store miscellaneous pictures in. But that was not the problem. The problem was that none – not a one – of them were marked on the back with a name or year. I could pretty much figure out who was who, especially during the school years, but it’s not as easy as you would think to figure out which was a child's first grade versus second grade picture and even harder to tell whether a child was 18 months or 2 years. And it didn’t help that Katie and Sarah looked identical when they were babies! A couple of times I went downstairs to ask Jim: okay, which baby is this? I give him lots of credit for being able to figure out the answer more than once! The only thing that saved me from going completely nuts during this project was that the most of the grade school pictures came with a class composite complete with year and grade, and some of the high school pictures were stuffed back into the original folders the orders came in.
So, my question is: why can’t they add a little imprint with the year on each of the photos? It can be somewhere inconspicuous, like the corner. And it can be done tastefully: one of Jimmy’s baby pictures had the studio logo and year in the corner and it was barely noticeable.
In the meantime, all you parents and parent-wannabes: label your pictures now. It'll save frustration later.

Library tales

I love libraries. All those books -- so little time. And I love the fact that libraries have gone techy -- my library card is a little tag on my key chain, and I can "browse" online, reserve a book online and then pick it up on my way home. But I really miss those due date cards that used to be stuffed into that little pocket in the front of the book. They made such great bookmarks! The computer-generated "receipt" that they give out now looks like every other receipt in my purse and gets lost too easily.
I also love the library's annual book sale. When I picked up my book, we happened upon the last days of the book sale. All the books you can stuff into a plastic bag for the hefty price of one dollar! The selection is usually hit or miss, but it's a great opportunity to take a chance on a book you otherwise might not buy, if you take the time to look through the piles. Jim got a copy of a history book he used in schoool, a book on growing up Catholic (which he proceeded to guffaw his way through for the next several days) and some maps that came from old National Geographics someone had donated to the library. This last resulted in a heated, whispered discussion on book sale ethics. I picked up Ladies of Liberty, Cokie Roberts' follow up to Founding Mothers; a book by Donny Duetsch; Tom Brokaw's Boom, about the 60s; and one of Sara Paretsky's mysteries (my mother was astonished that I, a confirmed serial mystery addict, had never read any of her stuff, especially since it's set in Chicago). And for less than 20 cents each, I ended up with some pretty good reads!