Autumn

I’m aware that technically it’s not quite Fall yet but the mornings are getting chillier, big yellow school buses are back on the roads and my garden is starting to quiet down after a Summer of lush foliage and riotous blooms.   I’m ready to quiet down with it.  I’m really looking forward to Fall scented candles, fires in the fireplace, throwing more blankets on the beds, making pumpkin soup and, of course, Halloween.

Our family does an annual Halloween Party and the competion for the best costumes is fierce.  The rules are simple:  No repeating your costume for five years.  So the variety of costumes from year to year is really amazing.  There are so many good ones we usually have five or six categories to win in.  There is scariest, funniest, most effort, most unrecognizable, best group or couple.  And the grand prize goes to the person that got the most votes overall, regardless of category. 

Come Halloween time I’ll dedicate an entire post to the party and post pictures of all the winners.  Truly the creativity in designing and making the costumes is staggering.  My husband was a man taking a shower one year – that was pretty incredible (except everyone kept trying to peak behind his shower curtain to see what he did or did not have on). 

One of my sisters was a table in an Italian restaurant.  She created a round circle and covered it with a checkered table cloth – there was a serving of spaghetti, a chianti bottle with the obligatory drippy candle stuck in it – she poked her head out of the center of the table and had a hat that looked like a pot of flowers on her head for the centerpiece. 

My nephew outdoes himself every year – the year Pirates of the Carribean came out he was the perfect Jack Sparrow.  The next year he was a cobwebby mummy with chains hanging off of him.  He even dyed his hair grey for that costume.  I’m telling you there are no limits to the lengths we will go to for the coveted Grand Prize.

Truly all the costumes are great and I promise a post on the matter late October.

For now it’s on to pulling out the Fall decorations and trying to make a decent apple pie.  I haven’t succeeded yet but I’m going to keep on trying.  In a few more weeks we’ll plan a day trip up to Apple Hill for apple tasting and to pick up our yearly supply of apple butter.  If you live in Northern California or are planning a visit in September or October Apple Hill should be on your list of places to see.  Boa Vista Orchards is my favorite for apple butter and apple fritters.  Mmmm.