Preparing for winter...

Change is a measure of time and, in the autumn, time seems speeded up. What was is not and never again will be; what is is change.
--Edwin Way Teale
For man, autumn is a time of harvest, of gathering together. For nature, it is a time of sowing, of scattering abroad.

The smile that flickers on baby's lips when he sleeps- does anybody know where it was borne? Yes, there is a rumor that a young pale beam of a crescent moon touched the edge of a vanishing autumn cloud, and there the smile was first born . . . .
--Rabindranath Tagore


When I write or cross stitch I like to sit on my bed. It's about comfort and putting my legs up...but it is also about the fact that our bed faces west..towards the mountains.

When I pull the blinds up I can look through a lovely frame of tree branches right out at the Sleeping Indian and Devils Dead. (Dang...I need to clean my windows!!)To my right I can see scrub oak on the hill behind us,one of our cherry trees and Kaitlyn's baby willow. I keep an eye him because he IS just a baby!!

I can also watch the birds...including couple of humming birds who like to stop and rest on the branches of our silver leaf maple...the dogs, a squirrel that runs up and down our fence,an occasional rabbit and right now small flocks of birds that use our back yard as a rest stop on their way south. I love it most when the mist hangs on the mountains and seems to muffle the chaos of everyday life. This will be the first winter Jeff and I have stayed in THIS room...so I am looking forward to our first snow. For years I have longed for a room where I could sit by the window and watch the snow fall quietly against the backdrop of the mountains.

The other day I am sitting here,on my bed,cross stitching and all of the sudden it sounds like there is some kinda crazy bird riot going on. The the dogs start barking. So I get up to look around and this is what I see....

There is about a hundred little black birds with iridescent heads blanketing the side and back yard. The "yelling" was coming from a pair of magpies that reside here. So..the magpies are tattling..the dogs are barking...the little birds are twittering at the magpies...the squirrel is running UP and DOWN the fence..and as I look at an angle towards the front...there are two rabbits running and jumping. One LITERALLY did a flip it was so angst ridden at the chaos these little blackbirds had caused in our usually very pleasant yard!! I tried to get a photo but as I opened the window the flock of birds flew away. :(

The whole scene was like something out of a wacked out Disney movie or something!!!

What was REALLY interesting is this.... As I started looking around, at work, in the neighborhood etc...it seems that EVERYONE is just a little bit busier!! I'm not talking about regular busy...I mean that frantic AUTUMN kind of busy where everyone is "gathering nuts" and making preparations for that first snow. (Which is rumored to be this first weekend BTW.)I also find it interesting that you can actually chart the weather by the amount of books turned in at the library!!

We have a bit of that fall activity going on in our own home. I am baking and crafting more. ;) The dogs seem to be hanging out on the deck soaking up as much sun as possible. I NEED to get my bulbs planted and winterize the front yard!! The guys are doing some maintenance around the house trimming branches and such. Everyone is thinking about dragging out their sweaters. Kirsten is looking into classes at ACC for the spring semester. Kaitlyn just checked out a bunch of books at the library and Jeff is just counting every nice day a blessing before he has to put the motorcycle away for the winter.

Perhaps,even if you do not live in a place were the seasons show such drastic change,you should consider what steps you might take to prepare for winter. Be it a physical,calendar season...or a season of life.