Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid

Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays in the US. I like its quirkiness, the creativity and fun. Decorating the house has been something I always looked forward to it.

This year, however, has been different. The Halloween spirit never reached me - I was just too busy - with preparing and teaching my German class, with taking and editing high school senior pictures. I love doing both, but Halloween had to pay the price. My Halloween decoration this year came down to this:

I apologize to the birds for misusing their birdbath... good thing that there are more than just this one in my garden.

However, while walking around my neighborhood I noticed that there were more Halloween decorations than last year, and that made me really happy. The masked pumpkins were here last year, but they have multiplied this October.

They also got some spooky visitors.

The Geek and I love to take a walk after dinner, and we met quite some glowing creatures on our street.

Even though I haven't been in a real Halloween mood I enjoyed all these creatures very much. This one is my favorite - the bat dog!

Kaefer, however, got in the spirit and dressed up. I really really really love it. She made the dress herself - last year, for the Homecoming dance. A great re-use of a lovely dress! I "colored" her hair with a black hairspray so that her hair became darker. She even wore nylons - and it's hot here! Can you see who she is? (Who would wear nylons in 85° weather?)

(Hint: it's a lady from a very popular British TV series...)

Farm Fences

Of course there were many fences at the pumpkin patch we went to last Sunday. After all, it's a fully working dairy farm, and there have to be fences.

This was the part of the pumpkin patch reserved for school classes only - it's where the  pumpkins are "not bigger than your head". I remember when I was chaperoning with Kaefer's preschool and first two years or so at elementary school that I had to silently giggle what some students thought how big their heads were... funny.

Many fences here if you look closely. This was actually already the farm right across the road. As I mentioned in my last post, this is the area of Sonoma County that is mainly farm land and you don't find any vineyards. You can also see how dry the land is in our fourth year of severe drought.

I always have a weakness for barbed wire, I don't really know why.

And since you liked the calves so much, here are two more photos - behind a fence, of course. The calves had just been bottle fed and there was still some milk on the fence, and some of the calves thought they better lick it!

I'm linking to Theresa's Good Fences because these are definitely good fences!

October Means Pumpkin Patch

Processed with Kim's texture "golden" in soft light at 75%; texture removed from pumpkin

This year it first looked like we were skipping the pumpkin patch - the first time since we moved to the States. But on Sunday, when after some much needed rain the sun was shining brightly and it promised to be a gorgeous day, we spontaneously decided to visit a pumpkin patch.

We went to the same pumpkin patch as last year. This is a very low key pumpkin patch - no corn maze, no jumpy houses - but also no fields where the pumpkins are trucked in every week. This is a working dairy farm that grows two large pumpkin fields with a wonderful variety of pumpkins (be prepared for lots of photos):

I absolutely love the many different pumpkins you can pick here - yes, all of them are on the vine, they're prickly to twist off, but they're wonderfully real. These are by far not all of them!

The farm is located along Bodega Avenue between Petaluma and Bodega Bay where Sonoma County is still mainly agricultural and not so much wine country. I love this area!

Processed with "golden" - my go-to texture - in soft light at 100%; texture removed from pumpkin

Kaefer is sixteen now (and two weeks ago she passed her driver's test and is the proud owner of a brand new drivers license - and perfectly able to drive a stick!), but she still loved running around the pumpkins searching for the perfect one. Her quirky sense of humor is always present!

As I mentioned, this is a working dairy farm where you can also buy eggs, milk and European style butter. They have goats, geese - and these cute calves that visitors were allowed to feed from milk bottles. I offered my fingers to one calf and it enthusiastically sucked on them (I have loved doing this since I was a child and accompanied my Dad, who was a veterinarian, on his tours to the farms around my hometown in Germany).

I am linking up to Kim Klassen's Texture Tuesday - there is some wonderful texture work to admire!

Hanging Pumpkin in a Fairy Garden

While Jo and I did our tour through some local nurseries we stopped in between at Wildflour Bakery in Freestone for some scones. Their scones are legendary good - I had a Gravenstein apple, raspberry and marzipan one whereas Jo enjoyed a Meyer lemon and raspberry one. I think she also had almonds in hers. They are sinfully good!

Kim's texture pumpkingrunge in soft light at 30%

The bakery has a little garden in the back where we retreated to eat our scones at some place in the shade (it was a very hot day). At the end of this natural tunnel we saw this huge pumpkin hanging, further secured with some garden twine. I expected some fairies turning up and dancing on this pumpkin!

Kim's texture dustyrose in soft light at 65% (texture brushed from pumpkin), 

copy and multiply at 65%

I'm linking up with Kim's Friday Finds - a new favorite of mine!

Getting Our Pumpkins

One of the October traditions we have adopted since living in the States is a visit to the pumpkin patch. I had thought that Kaefer might be a bit too old for that, but no - she came with us and had a wonderful time at the dairy farm that we discovered this fall, being like a little kid again.

It was a very low key pumpkin patch compared to some others which offer a wide variety of activities to families. This one had a few animals (goats and cows) that you could visit and pet, a jumpy house and a "sandbox" filled with organic wheat which seemed to be the biggest attraction. Beside the field of pumpkins of course.

This pumpkin patch was also different since it not only offered the typical jack-o-lantern pumpkins, but all kinds of different pumpkins as well. They were grown right there and most of them were still on the vine.

 One "thing" I always love at a pumpkin patch - beside my favorite color - is watching the kids. These little girls were adorable while they ran through the field, looking for the perfect pumpkin.

This toddler was irresistibly cute!!

And as you can see, this includes my own "little" girl.

Did I mention that she was like a little kid again?

Posing as the Pumpkin Lady Liberty

What about you? Do you visit a pumpkin patch in October?

I am linking up to Mandarin Orange Monday.

Celebrating Fall Colors

Inspiration Avenue is all into fall, and so this week's theme is "Celebrating fall colors of orange, yellow and brown". Oh bliss. May I add a little bit of green as well, please.

A couple weeks ago Jo and I went to the National Heirloom Expo here in town. It was a feast for the eyes, the nose and yes, if we had eaten there, the tasting buds. There was one building at the expo that was dedicated to pumpkins and gourds - at least so it seemed when you entered the building.

The heart of the expo certainly was this pyramid of gourds, squash and pumpkins:

But when you walked around this building - and we did go into every little corner of it - you saw other things apart from pumpkins and gourds that showed the glory of autumn - all heirloom, of course.

Flowers were all over the place as well - and they fit perfectly the color scheme of orange, yellow and brown.