The pergola looks so bare, cos I just cut the beans down.  We had our first hard freeze last night, so now everything out there is officially done. Several of the bamboo pieces across the top bowed a little under the weight of heavy vines, but it’s still looking good and we’ll leave it up over the winter.  In the spring we can replace a piece or two if we have to.

In the next few days I’ll take down tomatoes, and Hopi Limas, then pull up hot pepper plants. The things inside the fence area are already gone, and the ground will get enriched with compost and manure over the winter.

Better to get this stuff all  done now cos there’s always a lot to do in the spring with the garden getting started. Plus there will be a wedding to get ready for, when Dylan and Eliza get handfasted on 5/1. I get to be a very happy mother and mother in law on the day when they make their promises to each other at handfasting, and have a bright beginning doing it on Beltane.

I took a picture yesterday of a lady bug and a purple jalapeno flower, and it was good I did then.  Also, one of tomatoes still trying, right up till the end.

Eliza wanted to try small watermelons but they didn’t do much at all. There was one still down there and I saw that somebody had enjoyed this one, squirrel or chipmunk or both.  They left the seeds and that surprised me.

So it’s a sad day to have to begin to dismantle the garden, but the cycle continues and things are as they should be. I’m celebrating my 67th birthday today, and still feel like there’s a very young person on the inside, just the outside part has more wrinkles and aches and pains.  But that’s ok, cos that’s all just as it should be too.  The cycle includes all of life, and in the spring the earth will give us more blessings of good things to eat, and the pleasure of working the earth to help it along.  Bright blessings to you, my readers, as most of you head into winter.