The last of my summer visitors has gone home. Yesterday Megan’s family had the tour then packed her into the car and off she went. I have been so lucky with my summer visitors this year. You met them all – some have become and will remain very good friends.
So now it is only Hugo and I for a while, we have visitors coming during the Autumn months but no more workers which is just as well because Hugo and I can easily cover the last of the work together and the food that I plant and freeze for our summer volunteers is about all gone. The gardens are almost bare.
The weather is so mild and lovely, and will be for a few weeks yet, so I hope to be able to harvest the last of the tomatoes, there will be no green ones hanging on the vines this year. By the time winter comes Hugo and I will have the whole farm, both barns and all the gardens tidied and squared away ready for the cold.
The Plonkers are getting fat, laying about in the late summer sunshine, Sheila and Poppy have been let out into the field again, Sheila took being locked in very hard and would not go to the toilet until I let her out, so my hand was forced really. I hope they have calmed down enough to stay in their own field but who knows. The chooks are wandering about doing what chooks do. 
Today we are working on the compost piles, and the wood heap and giving the West Barn it’s weekly clean up. Megan helped plant new trees in the Fellowship Forest and these need watering so this will be on our list until the freeze. In this environment it is a good idea to have a new tree well watered for when the freeze finally comes, this (and the mulch) helps insulate the roots against temperature fluctuations. I need to keep thinking ahead to the winter now so I am prepared – in case it is another bad one.
Life is all about preparation isn’t. It is a good thing to be well prepared then we can handle any surprises with a certain amount of grace. I hate Chasing the ball, I prefer to be be Holding it, preferably tucked under my arm like a fat hen.
Almost time to start filling my bird feeder again.
Have a lovely day.
celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
38 responses to “The Last of the Summer People”
The Fellowship Forest!!! How lovely. Much love, Gayle
As you put the Farmy to bed for the winter, safely tucked up and everything to hand, I’m preparing for the onslaught of summer, although whether we get a Wet at all this year is looking increasingly debatable. We’ve had no proper rain since June… Do I plant for the summer, knowing that if I do, the insects will descend and ravage everything green and tender? Or do I say Not This Year, El Niño says no. I’m very envious of your beautiful bird feeder, but it wouldn’t cope with the gang of two dozen lorikeets, assorted honey-eaters, aerial displays of drongos and the flock of ducks who come to our yard for food and water in this harsh season. I love the sense of peace and accomplishment coming from this post, and I’m very grateful for the chance to share in the changing seasons of your life…
I love the idea of all those big birds in your yard – I have my trusty sparrows and not much else! c
You feel a flock of beady eyes on you every time you go out the back door. Hopeful beaky faces eyeball you to see if there might be something tasty hidden in your pockets. And the excitement when I refill the big bird bath once or twice a day – I barely have time to get clear before the squawking flock descends…
Kate: Don’t know whether you get ‘noisy miners’ as far north as you are: being breeding season here they seem to be around in their hundreds, always whooshing past one by just a cm or two to spare . . . and talk about beady eyes indeed every time I have my lunch outdoors: piercing angry stares!! Oh and magpies around do send me indoors until they seem to have found another ‘victim’! Good luck with the rains!!
We only have the native variety, not the invasive Indian ones, and the lorikeets are pretty successful at keeping those in their place. The magpies so far are polite and respectful. They walk up to my feet, cock their heads and look hungry…. Same with the butcher birds.
It looks like rain might be on the way; it’s been stormy and overcast all day without actually dropping anything but at least the clouds are there…
It is a good thing to be prepared for what we know is to come… but then we never REALLY know what it will be – better or worse than we expect. So we make preparations as best we can, and we feel good about it. I watch the squirrels harvesting and burying pecans and acorns (there’s a bumper crop this year), and busily building their winter homes – some in the hollows of trees and some in giant leaf nests in the trees. Those of us who grew up preparing for the winter months all through the summer and autumn, are much like the squirrels. It’s a lovely thing to keep busy harvesting, canning, drying and freezing -feeling good at the end of the day and know that if hard weather hits, we have what we need.
The big rains in May this year made for such a disappointing garden here too. I was surprised by that – I thought the opposite would happen – we’d have lush plants and a bountiful harvest. Fortunately, my smallest tomatoes (the cherry and the plum plants) put off lots of fruit, so I was able to make a good supply of roasted tomato sauce for winter. And oddly, the smaller tomatoes, which are always sweeter, made for the best batches of roasted tomato EVER! It’s also a wonderful thing to be surprised with success, when you counted on being disappointed!! Ha ha!
Early falls lovely days when things tend to slow down a bit and the light is so beautiful…I really do like…notice I didn’t say love…that term is reserved for summer! 🙂 I also love Sheila and that beautiful bird feeder you have!
Our preparations are far less than yours, but nonetheless I feel the same as you. I chased the ball too much throughout my life…at this peaceful time I prefer to keep it firmly in both hands:)
There’s something about “winter coming” that makes me hold my breath. The pictures today seem to presage its coming. Especially the sweet bird feeder waiting to be of service.
Seems like you were just welcoming the first of this year’s Summer People. I stripped my tomato plants of all the green tomatoes and made relish last week. I do have cherry tomatoes yet. That single plant took over the flower bed. I’ve been cutting back all of the tomato plants and have re-discovered 3 of the pepper plants with, believe it or not, a few ripe peppers. i’ll pickle them if I can find anymore.
I can sense the winding down in your words, a slower pace. I hope the winter is kind this year.