October gave a party;
The leaves by hundreds came-
The Chestnuts, Oaks, and Maples,
And leaves of every name.
The Sunshine spread a carpet,
And everything was grand,
Miss Weather led the dancing,
Professor Wind the band.
The Chestnuts came in yellow,
The Oaks in crimson dressed;
The lovely Misses Maple
In scarlet looked their best;
All balanced to their partners,
And gaily fluttered by;
The sight was like a rainbow
New fallen from the sky.
Then, in the rustic hollow,
At hide-and-seek they played,
The party closed at sundown,
And everybody stayed.
Professor Wind played louder;
They flew along the ground;
And then the party ended
In jolly "hands around."
A perfect day for a walk out on to the Cowichan River estuary road. I even persuaded my cousin Bonnie to join us (mind you it didn`t take MUCH persuasion!)- a rare treat to have her with us, as our mutual schedules are often miles apart.
I have been reading a wonderful blog called Letters From The Red Thread Cafe" by Shiloh Sophia.. She has returned to the Orthodox church after many years of searching and her journey and videos are wonderful to view and muse upon. In one of her posts, she explained why her blog is dedicated to Our Lady Of The Red Thread and published a photo of the Madonna with a drop spindle in her left hand, crimson wool wrapped around with a single skein looping from it.
"A Russian icon from the Novgorod School, dating to the first half of
the twelfth century. It is now held by the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow.
The icon is commonly known by the name the “Ustyug Annunciation.”
Rhea is one of the 62 plus of Saturn's moons (they keep finding more) and I'm sitting on the front porch of my artist retreat villa, in downtown Satelliteville on Rhea.
I am trying out various writing programs, such as SimpleMind, and Polaris Office which SAVE my work unlike others. Evernote I have yet to tackle but I like the idea of being able to go back and forth from pc to tablet with the sync feature. We will see.
My paternal grandfather was Swedish and my grandmother was Norwegian and other than a once a year treat of lefse during the Holiday Season, that was pretty much it as far as cultural heritage went. It wasn't until we moved to the city and the Danish Home held Midsomerfest on its grounds, that I became more knowledgeable about my Scandinavian roots. I have always been aware of the Celt in me thanks to my mother but I am not even sure my father knew anything of his heritage. He definitely did not talk much about it, probably due to the fact that his father, my grandfather left home at 16 and never looked back.
I am missing my regular Vaio pc dreadfully as of course it has my Entire Life on it and it is currently in the hands of the Staples techies. They are saying 3-5 business days but that's an Eternity to someone like me who is so tech dependent. Thank goodness we were able to blow the dust off an aging Acer that Mr Bear had downstairs and I am now able to finish my project on that as I don't have much time either. This has to be done before end of the month.
I was trying out the FX key on the Japanese maples photo: not sure if I like it but interesting don't you think?
Quietly
The Drive North into the fog
The Break of Sunshine
One of the amazing artlies in the group is Ozegran from Australia and as it her Summer when Christmas comes calling, I decided to do one up just for her.
The other card was done with a Scandinavian flavour as a nod to my paternal grandparents.
Dear Perusers: Quail Hill was wreathed in fog this morning, though it did burn off by mid afternoon. 
Other than that: it was another Sparkling Pumpkin Cider Day, so warm that folks were wearing tank tops and t shirts and yet chilly enough in the shadows to warrant a good sweater.
ave not yet made up my mind if we are going to do the annual Calendar to send out this year, yes yes I know, time and tide.
Next month it will be Movember: raising awareness and funds for Prostate Cancer research and on it goes.
So, those are my 2 thoughts on this glorious Fall Twosday and since I can't go outside to shoot (darnit I have caught the sniffles, so staying indoors and dosing myself with oil of oregano), I have had to make do with our table bouquets from yesterday. On the left is my table offering from Quail Hill's garden: lavender, hydrangea, japanese anemone 'fingers', sunflowers and dahlias and on the right, is Ms P's lovely hostess gift of miniature yellow gerberas. 
Apologies for the lateness of this post, but I was on Holiday yesterday and so was the blog.
It was a 'O aren't you glad to be here kind of day': you know the kind, where the birds are singing and the maples are flaming and the compost pile hides a multitude of pumpkins within their twining leaves. One of our guests, Mr B rooted around in the farm's giant compost pile and found a ginormous 15 lb pumpkin.
(Ms P sniffs at those who use stencils) and with a few whacks 
and cuts, Ta Da! One Carved Pumpkin!
First there was beading, then there was threading the beads, then the hot glue gun came out of hiding, and finally Feathers, lots and lots and lots of feathers. ( I suspect we may be finding bits of fluff and glitter in our gravy!) 
Our first stop was Russell Farms to pick up some of their Spartan Apples and to shoot their annual Pumpkin Truck perched on a grassy field and surrounded by glorious orange globes.
the creeper is the reddest and we almost got the right timing today. From the looks of it, we may be off by a few more weeks.
There is a small town about 20 minutes away from us called Chemainus which has one of the prettiest little down towns ever seen and is easily navigated inside of five minutes.We chose to eat at The Willow Cafe in one of the historic landmarked building. It is right next door to the church and I think might have been the school house or a hotel.
The Yam and Ginger Soup had my name written all over it (especially when it came with a hot from the oven Cheese Scone!) and Mr Bear went for the Split Pea and Ham. 
Outside in the golden Autumn late afternoon, we had an unexpected guest, a Sparrow who demanded his fair share of our scone crumbs! He did not know the meaning of the word fear at all and hopped up right on to the TABLE, mere micro inches from our plate! When offered, he even took a large crumb from my fingers.
