Blogtober - Day Thirty One

Well, here we are the last day of Blogtober.  Thirty one days of posts some happy, some not so, some easy to write, others not so.  Some days knowing exactly what I wanted to write about, others struggling for inspiration and words.

I want to say a big Thank You to everyone who has been reading and leaving comments.  I've enjoyed  reading your comments immensely and have enjoyed replying to them.  I hope to catch up with your blogs over the next day or two if I haven't already done so.

It's All Hallows' Eve.  I don't know if we will have any 'trick or treat' children around.  I have a little packet of sweets just in case.  I think the idea in the area, according to the local on-line forum, is that if you wish to have knocks at the door you put some sort of decoration outside or in your window.  Quite a few houses around have decorations in the window or carved pumpkins outside the door already.

Paul has carved our pumpkin, it's only a small one and there is enough flesh left to make soup.

I went into the garden to collect some leaves for the pumkin to sit on.

Whilst I was out there I collect a few of the last blooms of October for the kitchen table.

Cosmos, Echinacia, hardy Geranium and Verbena.

Look what has opened up overnight.

The first Paperwhite flowers to take us into November.

A Monday Miscellany

 This and that from the last few days mostly in photos as I don't have words, they seem to have left me for the moment. 

 Below - a few photos from a visit to the Staffordshire Wildlife Trust's headquarters at Wolseley Bridge.

At the Garden Centre next door there were pumpkins galore.

A couple of days later we popped up to the Emma Bridgewater factory for morning coffee.  There were lots of pumpkins there too in the courtyard and garden.

Meanwhile back home in the garden.  Winter violas and berries are adding colour here and there.

Also spotted in the garden

 

Mushrooms

Some knocked over by foxes or badgers as they were growing in what we call the fox run at the back of the raised beds.

 

The huge bite out of the red cabbage is definitely down to a badger.  We've now harvested all the cabbages and distributed them to neighbours.  We will pickle some later too.
 

All for now.  Take care everyone.

 

At the End of October

We've been out and about locally this week.  It is also half term and everywhere is very busy. Cars were queueing to get into Trentham Gardens as we left after our walk around the lake yesterday morning. Inside pumpkin carving was underway.  I didn't take any photos of this as there were lots of people around.  

I did take a few photos late last week of some of the pumpkin games that had been set up in the formal gardens.

 

 Dahlias and Pumpkins

 

Noughts and Crosses

 

Giant spider (there were lots of those)  and below Hoopla

Meanwhile in the kitchen garden things were looking lovely and the displays more natural.

 Much more to my taste - in the shed

 Squashes

 In the greenhouse

I loved this delicate display of heuchera and grasses.

In the garden centre a table had been set with displays of pumpkins, squashes and grapes.  Non of them real of course.

They were very pretty but I still preferred the displays in the kitchen garden.

 Up towards the city centre the Emma Bridgewater factory and shop was also decorated with pumpkins.

 We popped in for a coffee and took a peek in both the shops.  One present was purchased.

We haven't bought a pumpkin to carve this year but

sweets have been bought ready to hand out at the door now it is All Hallows' Eve, Hallowe'en or Halloween.  I wonder how many little ghosts, wizards and witches will visit this year?

Cool Pumpkins

You may remember my gardening  post  from August this year?  Well three and a half of the pumpkins survived. One was slightly chewed by slugs so we cut the bad parts away and used the good flesh to make a pumpkin pie.  That was a few weeks ago.  The other three pumpkins were harvested at the same time and have been sitting on top of the fridge waiting for this weekend.

We had pumpkin soup on Saturday from one of the carved pumpkins and I found a recipe on-line which Paul adapted and used to make Pumpkin bread yesterday (he'll be adding it to his bread website later - see my sidebar for the link).  The bread is actually more like cake but was a lot tastier than the soup - I preferred the butternut squash soup we made last weekend. 

Last night we had about five different groups of 'Trick or Treaters' - the little ones came first in splendid costumes, their parents hovering halfway up the drive.  Our last group were some boys of about ten or eleven years old.  We had put the smaller of the two carved pumpkins near the front door with a lighted tea-light inside to guide the way - after the boys had taken two or three sweets from the bowl one of them said  to me 'Thank you, Happy Halloween - I like your pumpkin - it's small, but cool!'

Later it was lovely to sit in the light from the pumpkins and other candles with a glass of wine and Downton Abbey on the television.

We've saved the seeds from the pumpkins and the butternut squash to see if we can grow some more next year.

Look what's growing

You may remember this post from back in June when I was hoping that the pumpkin plants we'd grown from seed would produce some pumpkins. Well, look what has happened!

We have not one

not two

not even three - but four pumpkins

I'm hoping that they will survive until the end of October!

Pumpkin

I thought that this year it would be great fun to grow our own pumpkin for Halloween. We bought a packet of seeds and sowed a few of them. We have had two or three plants grow from the seed.

This one was recently planted in the raised bed, behind the lupins, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we will have a pumpkin ready for October!

It's Halloween!

Whilst I was speaking to a friend on the 'phone a couple of days ago there was a knock at her door and her husband went to answer it; he came back to say it was 'trick or treaters' who were calling early because they were flying out to Teneriffe on Saturday! Does anyone else think this is slightly bizarre?


Anyway I have a bowl full of little packets of chocolate buttons for all the little witches, elves, ghosts and fairies who may call. The bigger ones wearing scream masks, Dracula teeth or with hatchets in their heads will have to swallow their 'street cred' and manage with buttons too - if there are any left from the first round of little ones of course!

I've dug out my 'Scottish Play' tea towel from the bottom of the drawer, not used all that often, but quite apt for today I think.

However you spend Halloween, have a great time!

Pumpkins, Steam Trains and a bit of Mime

The Mime artist above was helping to encourage people into the new L'Occitane shop at Trentham Gardens retail outlet. I didn't need much encouragement but he escorted me into the shop anyway. I love L'Occitane perfumes and was bought their 'Eau de 4 Reines' for my birthday this year. For those of you who know Trentham, L'Occitane is in the unit where the Emma Bridgewater shop used to be - next door to the Yankee Candle Shop. The mime artist had a friend playing suitable French music on an accordian - all very entertaining.

Meanwhile, in the Trentham Garden Centre they are getting into the mood for Halloween with loads of witchy, batty and spidery displays inside whilst outside we found these lovely displays of pumpkins and gourds.

It was Steam Train weekend at the Churnet Valley Railway and after our long Sunday morning walk we stopped by on the way home to watch the 2p.m. train leave Froghall for Cheddleton.

Froghall is a lovely station and very well kept by the volunteers who help run this railway.

The sounds and smells of the train as it left the platform brought back some childhood memories of travelling on the railways.

Woosh - it was gone in a puff of smoke under the road bridge and on its way to Cheddleton.