Festivals, Hikes, & Temperatures I Like

Road trip weekend!  Of course, I continue to be a terrible traveler.  Carsick?  Absolutely (thankfully, no picture exists of me hunched over Todd's rain jacket in lieu of a plastic vomit bag).  Insomnia?  Check.  General queasiness?  Absolutely.  But we still managed to have a good time. 

We went to North Carolina to visit family, hike, and attend the John Campbell Folk School annual festival.  Wow, what a crowd!

Over 200 vendors were selling pottery, fiber goods, plants, food, metal ware, wooden furniture (and lots of birdhouses!), and many other things.  I loved the intricate work in the coin carving booth...

...loved seeing all the cool things created out of wood and metal...

...and all the fiber arts exhibits - knitting, weaving, and quilting.

Live music, too!

I love this image.  It is scarcely different from what we would've seen 150 years ago - a woman bent over a roasting chicken, a quilt over the vehicle entrance to keep the dust out.  Replace the old pick-up with a covered wagon and it's suddenly 1860!

North Carolina is beautiful.

And, might I add, much cooler than where we live.  Nighttime temperatures were in the mid-40s (!!!!) and we had amazing 55 degree weather while we hiked.  The perfect hiking temperature, I think! 

Borga was raring to go.

She slept in my lap the whole way home!

Here in SC, we're finally experiencing cool mornings and nights, although days are still in the mid-80s and expected to reach 86 again by the weekend.  But there are more signs of impending cooler weather.  Our turkeys are back! 

I've seen them several times, and I hear them gobbling noisily every morning. 

Our window screens are covered by shield bugs, just like every autumn. 

They're harmless, but they're trying to get inside so they can over-winter in our walls.  We see them inside sometimes, especially in the spring when the warmer weather wakes them from their winter stupor. 

Meanwhile, the cats are just taking it easy, regardless of the temperature.

Have a great week!

Gutter Flutter

It's 65 degrees right now, but with the wind it feels positively chilly.  I'm comfortably wrapped up in a shawl, even as I have all the windows open to flood the house with the wonderful fresh air.  Fall is my favorite season, and I'm loving it - chilly breeze and all.

I've been knitting like crazy in preparation for the Christmas season, but also because nothing feels cozier in the fall than to curl up with a ball of yarn at your side and a project in your lap.  Here's a peek of a few things that I've been working on:

 

 

I don't think I've ever had so many knitting projects going at the same time!  I'm already looking ahead to future projects.  I keep saying that I'm going to start knitting for myself, and I'm going to start with a pair of fingerless gloves...something that sounds really good right now!

We're doing our end-of-season yard work, too.  Todd has been up on the roof, cleaning the gutters.

We've both been working in the beds, weeding and pruning, and Todd swept up the paint chips from our recent house painting.

We spent an hour in our little swinging seat this weekend, looking out over the water and enjoying the wonderful weather.  Starting next weekend, our board games will be played down there, with a roaring fire going in the outdoor fireplace.  A double hooray for fall!

We can see the changing seasons in the insects, too.  These brown shield bugs are all over our screens.

They want inside, a warm place where they can overwinter.  They're harmless to us, but destructive to crops.  They're actually native to Asia, but came over here sometime in the 1990s, probably in shipped goods.  They have no natural predators here, so they've been able to spread quickly!

Spiders, of course, are everywhere in the fall.  This beauty is Neoscona crucifera and lives just outside our bedroom patio door.

 

Lots of spiny-backed orb weavers around...

...and lots of tattered web remains in this late season.

It's fun to be working and observing outside in the fall, but fall baking is a great joy for me too.  Hearty stews and homemade bread, roasted chicken, squash and late-season root vegetables are all nice, but it's the sweets that hold a special place in my heart...starting with pumpkin bread. 

I have a favorite recipe, of course (recipe here), but I kicked it up a notch this week by adding 1/2 teaspoon of cardamon, leaving the ground cinnamon at one teaspoon, and adding a cup of cinnamon chips.  I can't believe how much that improved an already-wonderful recipe.  Letting it sit a day or two makes it even better.

I do decrease the white sugar by one cup now, because 2 cups of sugar plus (or without) frosting is plenty for us.  But if you're feeling indulgent, go for it!  Just don't forget those cinnamon chips...they really take it to the next level. 

Have a great week!