Day 294: Garden Decommissioning

When the weather gods bless you with an anomaly like this, there's really nothing you can do but find excuses to get outside.

One of these is not like the others...

Today's excuse: the leaves need raking! One of my favourite things about living in this part of the world is having four very distinct seasons (although I must say southwestern Ontario's "winter" leaves something to be desired). And of the four seasons, fall is probably my favourite. Yes, the spring blooms and summer warmth and winter snow are all beautiful reasons to soak up the outdoors... but there's nothing quite like the brilliant blast of colour painted across our country when autumn rolls around.* Perhaps it's the many childhood drives through Gatineau Park with my family to admire the changing leaves that is to blame. It seems impossible for me to walk past trees blazing with oranges, reds and yellows - literally glowing in the light of a late afternoon sun - and not feel like everything in the world is perfect. I've never had one of those beautifully bright maples on any property where I've lived but one of the trees in our front yard is winning me over with another trick I love: leaves that show three or four colours at once.

This sly maple knows just the way to my heart...

So what are we doing with all of these falling leaves? This is indeed the time of year when curbs on garbage day are covered with yard waste bags that get turned into compost by the city. (We benefitted from 1000L of this free dirt in the spring!) But instead of sending off our leaves, we're using them as leaf mulch for the garden bed and compost. With three mature trees on our little lot, we may end up sending off some yard waste bags once all is said and done but using the leaves we've got to feed our own soil and compost first makes sense.

It's all part of the garden decommissioning process that we started at the end of September by yanking out the cucumber, watermelon, lettuce and corn plants that were done being productive. (There were also pea plants but these were so tiny it's hardly worth mentioning - though Garrett did take down the wire mesh supports for use next year.)

Contemplating in front of the plant burial pile.

Garden decommissioning process started.

The decommissioning continued last Saturday with the last of the rhubarb harvested and the tomatoes and beans pulled out.

Leaf mulching around the sole survivors.

The broccoli plant and a surprise visitor.

The garden hasn't completely called it quits yet. We still have a bunch of potatoes waiting patiently in the back left corner of the garden. Without a good root cellar, we figure they're better off in the ground for now until we eat/conjure up something better to do with them.

That broccoli plant, the lone survivor from the dozen or so seeds we started and six seedlings we planted, is finally producing something that looks like broccoli!

Why did I take so long to grow? Am I tasty?

You might also notice another patch of bright green beside the little path of stones. Even though lots of people do an autumn salad garden, we weren't planning on doing a fall planting of lettuce. What we did do at the end of September was save a few lettuce seeds, yank out the plants, and plop them in a big pile of corn stalks and the like. Then we went out last weekend and found this:

Surprise! We think you need to eat more salad greens!

Awesome! Had we planned better, we could have actually tried to sow the seeds we weren't saving and  had more lettuce to eat over the past few weeks. In any case, we're letting this patch grow and will harvest before the frost comes. I've heard some varieties can even handle a light frost so we may be able to keep them for a while yet??

Finally, since this post isn't already long and rambling enough, I'll add in another couple of random notes.

First, check out this sweet little rug gracing our doorstep:

The 70s creeping slowly back into our little house.

After I absentmindedly trampled mud from the garden into the house, we pulled out this rug from a pile of old carpet in the garage left behind by the sellers. I love this thing. The wicked geometric pattern and orange colour make me want to keep it forever. It's at the side door, which is the one we use 99% of the time, but I think I'll put it at the front door for Hallowe'en. The colour is so autumn-y and should make the all-green carpeted porch a bit more inviting for the kiddos hunting for sweets.

Second, I'm happy to report that we've devised a temporary remedy for Garrett's Day 283 computer woes. Turns out the only way he can use his laptop is with an external monitor so we picked up this bad boy on sale at FutureShop. Here I am taking advantage with some dual screen awesomeness.

Poor TV... so unloved.

Settlers and Carcassonne. Awesome for so many reasons.

Yes, that is an old stair tread attached to leftover plywood with a piece of scrap 2x4 and hung off the drawers of the giant cabinet thing in our living room, counterbalanced with the perfectly weighted Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne board games. I did suggest the more boring solution of setting up a desk somewhere but this idea seemed too cool to not try. We only use the TV for the odd DVD or Wii game once in a blue moon. In fact, pretty much any movies or TV shows we watch are on the computer so this 20" LED monitor is quite the upgrade from our little 13" laptops. It's clearly a temporary solution but pretty awesome for the meantime. I'm thinking of attaching another board to the right for a mouse. The height difference between the monitor and keyboard is a bit too much but it's a nice change to be looking ahead at a big screen instead of always down at the laptop. Ergonomics for the win!

*Update: Apparently The Atlantic Cities agrees with me. If that's not validation, I don't know what is.