October
Well, it happened! Fall has come. Hum? Come or came? At any rate. It is here. When it was light enough to see this morning, we could see yards white with frost. I admit to thinking the first frost is pretty. However, it means the end to flowers. The hay fields become browner yet. And first frost also means a definite end to summer. I mentioned last time, we never really got summer. September however, made up for it. The beauty of fall, when I allow myself to appreciate it (mostly I just grumble..) here in the north where I live, is often overwhelming in glorious rays of magnificent color. However, we are still green. There is little color here yet. Some years, the leaves drop off from heavy frost before they really even change color. I know for many of you, fall is your favorite time of year. To me, it just means that tiny space of time before SNOW. And the radio just reported that for Saturday we are expecting rain and sleet. I am so NOT ready. You all know of my un-preparedness of the season. I do this each year. You would think I would learn.
The firewood is stacked neatly on 3 walls of the garage. And the shed has an ample supply stacked in it too. We heat the house with wood. While that probably seems somewhat outdated to many of you, many people in this area heat with wood. I was out early feeding the wild turkey herd their breakfast, the first of many daily feedings. And the smell of wood smoke in the heavy morning air was wonderful. There is a definite smell of fall in the air.By the way, our turkey herd is significantly smaller this year than in past years. One old tom, that thinks he rules. 4 females with him. And then my mama turkey, who must be a baby of my beloved mama who died 2 years ago. The babies of that mama turkey, were always very tame. This mama brought in her 10 babies early in summer. They come into the yard several times a day for food. If I don't get myself out in a timely fashion to feed them, they stretch out their necks and look at the house windows and the babies "sing" in a whistling noise they do. They are hard to ignore. I occasionally have to go out and referee between the baby group and the old tom group. Now that's ridiculous, I know.This appears to be the year that everything in our house needs to be replaced. Having had the same TV for several years, ours went kaput. So, we decide to look around town for the best deal. That theory got shot down when we just went to Wal-Mart and looked at features on several. I have told you many times of my non-technical brain. So Ronnie was pretty much on his own. Our old TV was so old we didn't even have a remote. Yes, that old! But we found a model that had a DVD and a VCR already in it. As we needed to buy both of them too, this was perfect. Un-hum. When we bought our OLD TV, you brought it home, plugged it in, and it worked. New ones require "programming". With a manual. With several cups of coffee. With one person reading the manual and one doing the "programming". Preferably with one person not being me. We did what we could do, with tempers flaring, his temper. I just sat with my manual, rereading instructions. Again and again. Finally when we could get CBS, I thought well OK, that's at least something. And on the dish, we could only get Sponge Bob Square Pants. I mentioned our plight to Beulah. She and Brian came up one evening, and in less than 15 minutes Brian had us all programmed. Without the manual reading, of course. This is one of the major reasons, people should have children!! I shudder to think what will become of our generation in future years.That day I also bought a new blood pressure cuff. Our old one was manually inflated with the bulb. The new one is a wrist cuff. WHAT was I thinking?? It too had to be programmed. Good grief! By the time you read the manual on that, get the batteries in right, and program the dumb thing, your blood pressure is a tad on the high side! I did manage to do that myself though. So things are looking up.Report on our Wisconsin trip. As you might have suspected, me and BrunieMae didn't have an uneventful trip. We usually don't. We only got lost, once. And that wasn't really our fault. Really! It wasn't. We tried to get the cop to give us a siren and lights escort back up to Racine, but he declined, with a smile...Our plan to come into the show, "stunning" was complicated by the fact that it was 90 degrees, dripping wet humid, flat out blowing winds (that not even a full can of hairspray could control the hair with), a downpour of rain 5 minutes before we got to our motel, the fact that I took the wrong pill at breakfast and ended up taking a Tylenol PM at 8AM, and a little mishap I had with butter at breakfast. Sitting at a table, certain body parts occasionally come in contact with the table. IF the table has your butter on the edge of it, it tends to make a smear on your body part. As I look down and was mortified (this is my day I am supposed to be "stunning", remember?), I try to flick it off with my finger. BrunieMae, always supportive, says "it barely shows". Well, the first time it probably didn't. The next 3 times of contact, until I finally figured out where the butter was coming from, made" barely showing", impossible. We sat in this crowded with well dressed eating area of the Holiday Express, at our table, in mild hysterics, laughing so hard, and trying not to draw attention to ourselves. Suspecting that BrunieMae might move to another table, we tried to ignore my butter. I spent the entire rest of the day, shopping and meeting appointments with my hair flying all over and looking like I was lactating. Eventually after we got into our next motel, in the pouring rain, I switched my butter shirt for my cleanest dirty shirt to wear, so we could make our appearance looking "stunning". We won't even talk about my trying to get into Wal-Mart driveways TWICE, or my throwing our $.40 toll fee into the feeder only to have most of it fall on the cement below... Ah... Wisconsin and Illinois toll roads... Michigan doesn't have these. And to my credit, my hands were sweaty. Brunie has a different version. But listen to mine. Her mind has been clouded by Wal-Mart episodes and she is not to be listened to.Anyway!! we had a great trip, inspite of all the above. We met Bonnie, Miss Elspeth (Wendy of www.pineberrylane.com), Connie and Kim, from Indiana, and got to spend two days with Holly. We shopped, loaded up the truck with goodies,spent a delightful evening after the show, having pizza and white sodas with Miss Els and Bonnie. Road trips with Brunie are always fun. She is www.saltboxfarm.com at Howard City.Well, this whole rambling letter is really to report to you that www.rantingraven.com comes out tomorrow on the first of the month as it always does. We are at http://www.rantingraven.com/Exhibit95.php . We are showing a birdhouse, some pumpkins, and a couple pumpkin makedo's. Right now, you can get a sneak preview of them athttp://www.highbuttonshoe.net/newitems.htm and also please check out the new shop pictures onhttp://www.highbuttonshoe.net/stepinto.htm . Beulah has made some changes in the home page of the website too. New colors, new font.I am busy still working on Halloween items. Our Great Pumpkin Caper is Oct 8 & 9 here at the farm. I will have new items yet for that. About mid October I start making Christmas. Guess the white frost on the ground will help spur me on in that...Thanks for asking to be a part of our farm.in fond regard,Miss Clotilda