AND THE BEAT GOES ON

“Look at mommy’s sad, sad flowers.”

My three year old granddaughter and I were on a tour around their yard yesterday and she was pointing out items of note. 

She and her brothers had already taken me to see the chickens and we had watched as the birds revelled in the fresh green grass we had thrown over the fence for them.

From there we had wandered over to where their mom had plunked her newest planter – an ancient truck (well, it’s older than me).  To date, all she has planted there is a small maple tree but next year there will be all kinds of flowers spilling out of its box.  It’s the kind of thing you can do when you have a huge rural yard and an imagination.

Onward we had explored, through some trees to the edge of a pond where everyone had a turn at throwing rocks in to the slimy green water. The nine year old was the only one getting his rocks in far enough away not to get any stinky backsplash.  The six year old kept wondering why his rocks weren’t going as far and why he kept getting wet.  It generally took the three year old three throws per rock to even get it wet.  Grandma decided it was time to move on again before we all got too messy.

The next stop was down by their signpost and garden.  The little ones rearranged some of the rocks as the eldest and I reminisced about the day we all erected the sign and which pieces of machinery were needed for the job.  I trusted him on his list; he is definitely the expert in that field.

Then it was back to their dad’s shop to show all the improvements that have been made to it and how neat all the tools were arranged in the tool boxes.  I was also given an in depth report on what they were fixing on his dad’s quad.  It was way over my head but I have no doubt he knew what he was talking about.

That took us back to the house and as we walked by what had been a pretty garden full of flowers until Jack Frost had shown up, the little girl pointed out the sadness of what he had left in his wake.  I agreed with her.  I too have gardens full of this particular sadness.

Although there are some species that can handle a few degrees of frost, most of the beauties are done for the year.  The dantura leaves and flowers droop to the ground displaying the spikey seed pods they’ve been hiding all summer.  Marigold flowers retain their brilliant yellows and oranges but the leaves and stems go black.  Cosmos go from ferny and fresh to ugly skeletons, and dahlias transition from lush, blossom covered shrubs to ruined, blackish, rotting messes overnight.  On the other hand, petunias and asters would seem to have antifreeze in the veins – they are doing just fine.

 But, as my very wise granddaughter observed, summer is over.

All is not lost though, the beauty and fun of autumn has just begun!

We spent the rest of the afternoon raking up poplar leaves so that they could run and jump and slide through them with me videoing every single award-winning athletic feat.  The sun was warm on our shoulders, the leaves crunchy beneath our feet.  There was tree climbing and posed pictures amongst the bright red crab apples and a grand finale of the tree of them sitting in the pile of leaves and tossing them into the air, again to satisfy Grandma’s wish for photographs.  They turned out perfect – each of their faces showing the fun they were having – even once or twice in the same picture!

We transitioned back to summer once more to end off the afternoon and laid a picnic blanket out on the lawn to enjoy freezie pops and fruit before the evening chill moved in on us, something that September can do in the blink of an eye, and began the conversation on whose pumpkin was the biggest to carve for Halloween.

And the year moves on ...