Farewell to Fall

Snow is in the forecast for tomorrow and since it's almost Christmas I guess I have to accept the fact that fall is over for this year. Somehow the blow of realizing that was somewhat softened today by the arrival of my 2012 seed catalogue from Baker Creek. This is how I know I'm a dorky grown up, I get excited about seed catalogues. So while I get ready to hunker down for a few months of winter and catch up with knitting I will be dreaming of my garden for next year and how I will somehow manage to cram in a few more plants that I haven't grown before.

So before I engulf myself in the final preparations for Christmas I thought it would be nice to take a look back at the fall.

This year I grew cabbages for the first time. I also made sauerkraut and kimchi, opening a new culinary door to lacto-fermentation.  In other gardening news I also got some nice pictures of Monarch butterflies which I had been trying to do all summer. There was also a hummingbird that I got a crappy picture of. It's hard when you're shooting something the size of a big bug that never sits still.

September is also when Jude and I celebrate our Birthdays. So there was celebration mixed in with those gorgeous Indian Summer days.

We also got to meet the pig that was being raised for us in September. Of course there was Charcutepalooza. I began to really focus on my food photography in the fall both for the competition and in general as well.

I found out that I'm really good at photographing apples. If you ever need an apple photographer I'm your girl.

 October was different this year. We had Halloween and a snowstorm which may be normal in some areas of the country but not in ours.

November was busy, busy, busy. Our pig went to the butcher and I got to do something I never thought I would do-I held her heart in my hands. Which was...well it was a moment.

On a lighter note I also did more canning this year than I have ever done before. In doing so I filled up my larder.

We also were able to welcome our newest niece Naiomi into the world. She was born the week before Thanksgiving and we got to see her on Thanksgiving when our families came to our house. It was so wonderful to host Thanksgiving this year. It was the first time we were able to hold it at our house. We even went to Hershey Park the day after which was really nice too.

There was time for leaf fights in the park...and then of course there was that little thing called the Charcutepalooza final challenge, where I made a four course meal for some good friends of ours.

I even had time to dream up a new food challenge for myself. It's going to be fun and I'm hoping a few people might want to play along. I'll be writing about that soon. I guess you can consider this your teaser.

It's was a great autumn. It went by in a whirlwind of memories that I will hold close to me. The year is wrapping up fast with Christmas only a couple of weeks away. I know it'll be New Years Eve before I find the time to blink. I'm excited to see what next year will bring.