☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄









When two seasons collide … (Part III)
☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄
A Texas City Girl In A Small New England Town
☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄
☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄
☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄
☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄
☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄
☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄☃❄
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November comes to an end, and so does the Autumn season. The days become shorter, and the nights are much longer. We have some nights below freezing. The greenhouse is done for this Autumn. Since mid-November, I fill the feeders with hot pepper bird seeds to keep away Bruno from trashing the trays. The birds don’t mind the hot seeds. It’s still November. But soon, the last month of the year will arrive.
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🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃🍂🍁🦃
by Mandy Cidlik
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The leaves hang on to the last moments of Autumn before they will give in to the wind, the cold gets too strong and they’ll drop. Yesterday, we had our first light snowfall in Connecticut. Winter sure is coming soon. Maybe we will have a white Christmas, again. 🎄☃❄
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This week it was unseasonably warm during the days in Connecticut. The nights were cold, which brought a lot of moisture. And therefore, we had to deal with some fog in the morning. The forest looked very enchanted; especially with celebrating Halloween/Samhain and Dìa de Los Muertos/Day of the Dead in the same week. A lot of leaves have been falling, and some of the trees are bare and look dead, which adds to the spooky appearance.
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💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁
💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁💀🍁
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Author: Clyde Watson
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🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻
🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻
Samhain marks one of the two great doorways of the Celtic year, for the Celts divided the year into two seasons: the light and the dark, at Beltane on May 1st and Samhain on October 31st. Some believe that Samhain was the more important festival, marking the beginning of a whole new cycle, just as the Celtic day began at night.
The most magically potent time of this festival is the night of October 31st, known today of course, as Halloween. The date marked both an ending and a beginning in an eternal cycle.
In the country year, Samhain marked the first day of winter, when the herders led the cattle and sheep down from their summer hillside pastures to the shelter of stable and byre. The hay that would feed them during the winter must be stored in sturdy thatched ricks, tied down securely against storms. Those destined for the table were slaughtered, after being ritually devoted to the gods.
All the harvest must be gathered in, barley, oats, wheat, turnips, and apples for come November, the faeries would blast every growing plant with their breath, blighting any nuts and berries remaining on the hedgerows. Peat and wood for winter fires were stacked high by the hearth. It was a joyous time of family reunion, when all members of the household worked together baking, salting meat, and making preserves for the winter feasts to come.
The Celts believed that at the time of Samhain, more so than any other time of the year, the dead were able to mingle with the living, because at Samhain the souls of those who had died during the year traveled into the otherworld. As a feast of the dead, it was believed the dead could, if they wished, return to the land of the living for this one night, to celebrate with their family, tribe, or clan.
https://www.deviantart.com/brightstone/art/Book-of-Shadows-Samhain
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Today, I will show you the pumpkins I carved for the “The Colony Family Fright Night” event in 2014. These pumpkins gained me 1st Prize. And the award was a $50 Movie Theater gift card. The white skull pumpkin is from Courtney. She asked me if I could capture a photo of it. It looks so cool, I had to add it to my Jack-o-Lantern photo collection.
🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻
… to be continued in October 2023
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Autumn
When the trees their summer splendor
Change to raiment red and gold,
When the summer moon turns mellow
And the nights are getting cold;
When the squirrels hide their acorns,
And woodchucks disappear;
Then we know it is Autumn.
Loveliest season of the year.
~ Charlotte L. Riser ~
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Another Saturday has arrived to show off some of my Jack-o-Lanterns from the year 2013. Some I carved for our local “Family Fright Night Campout”. And a couple of pumpkins, I carved for Halloween night.
🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻
… to be continued …
🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻
Author Unknown
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Katelynn wanted to help me with the pumpkin carving. So, I’ve got her a little pumpkin she could play with and get the pumpkin guts out. She always loved to say: “We need to get all the pumpkin yikes out!” And then she played with the gooey inside of the pumpkin.
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Sara was only twelve days old when we celebrated Halloween in 2009. She was such a cute little Pumpkin. Katelynn wanted to help with the pumpkins again, while her little sister took a nap. Katelynn was very proud of being a big sister. She really enjoyed taking Sara out for her first Trick-or-Treat. All bundled up we walked through the neighborhood and collected candy on this cool October night. The fresh air was good for the little munchkin.
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… to be continued …
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Kevin had a couple of motors, he wanted to use for something neat on Halloween. He decided to make moving cat eyes. A couple of tiki candle holders, styrofoam balls, and spray paint needed to be purchased. The strings, wooden picks, black foam sheets, and velvet fabric we had laying around the house. Kevin also installed some mini light bulbs inside the eyeballs. So, they were glowing, while they moved and stare at everyone.
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The same morning, but in a different part of Watertown: Kevin and I took a short trip to Black Rock State Park. While we were driving further down into the valley, the fog became denser. Actually, I wanted to capture some Autumn photos across the lake. Instead, I’ve got some fantastic fog photos of some golden maple trees. When we drove home, we got back out of the fog. On top of the hill, we had a nice view of the Naugatuck River Valley. The mist lay there like a blanket. The scenic view was stunning.
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Kevin and I waited until sunrise before we drove to Veteran’s Memorial Park for a nice walk on this crisp morning. We both warmed up quickly once we walked our first round. Since it was so nice, we decided to go for another round. While Kevin and I were at the park, we saw all these beautiful October Autumn colors. An Eastern Gray Squirrel munched on an acorn and built a bed after breakfast. Our critters prepare for the cold weather.
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Every day, the colors change in our yard and in our forest. I love how everything turns to gold, orange, and maroon. Colorful vines creep along the tree trunks, mushrooms grow on the fallen trees, berries become ripe and their skins split open. The colors of Autumn are so beautiful. 🍁🍄
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… This Halloween season was completely different from last year’s. Katelynn was excited to go to “Trick-or-Treat”. She knocked on the doors with a happy “T’ick-or-T’eeeeat”. Since she couldn’t pronounce the “r”, the neighbors thought she was adorable and gave her a lot of candy. After three houses we had to walk home to empty the bag before we could go out there and get more candy. Oh my, so much candy and no meltdowns anymore.
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In 2004 I heard about the Munster Mansion Replica when I watched VH1 while I was preparing dinner. I talked to Kevin about it. And one weekend, we drove from Dallas to Waxahachie. When we found it, we looked at it. The owner, Charles McKee waved at us, and we waved back.
A couple of years later, I read in the Dallas Morning News that the McKees have these weekend tours right before Halloween. Kevin and I got a babysitter for Katelynn, and down we went to Waxahachie again. They used the big parking lot in front of a local school. A school bus and a limousine were busy around the clock, picking guests up and dropping them off. It was a long wait. But once we were on the property, we had a lot of entertainment. One of the firebreathers asked me to pull a nail out of her nose. I replied, “… before this happens I will pass out.” Everybody in line was laughing. 😊
Once we made it inside the mansion, we were not allowed to capture photos or record any film. It made us pay more attention to the tour as well. If you like to see photos and documents, you can go to the official website and check it out for more information. Here is the link:
https://www.munstermansion.com/
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In 2007, Kevin had to go with Katelynn to Trick-or-Treat. I was still recovering from a knee injury and rather stayed at home. It was fun. Katelynn was dressed in her “Snow White” costume and received plenty of candy, while the neighbors and I were busy giving out candy. But I have to admit, I missed the door-to-door walk that year.
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… to be continued …
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The temperatures seem to be perfect for the greenhouse garden, this October. We still have quite a few snacker tomatoes. The beef-steak tomatoes are still green. And the flowers seem to do well. I also could harvest a banana pepper, a bell pepper, two eggplants, and half a bowl of cherry tomatoes and golden sun tomatoes. This Summer I started late because I waited for the greenhouse to be built. Therefore I will have a late harvest in Autumn.
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Diddlina is Diddl’s girlfriend. When I was younger, I was collecting everything about Diddl and his friends. I even made my own journals by drawing pictures of them. In October 2005, I decided I create Katelynn’s “Trick-or-Treat” bag myself. The bag I had from a previous occasion. The picture, I printed out, traced, and clued the tracing to construction papers. The broom got some tinsel I found in an art supply store. I used a black pen for coloring the face, hands, feet, hat, and costume, to give it character. And voilà, Katelynn had a “Trick-or-Treat” bag like no other.
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Autumn has arrived. Our yard and forest become more colorful as the season goes on. We had cooler nights, just above freezing, which help the leaves to turn into their beautiful colors. Just in time, the Autumn berries begin to ripen for the cold days ahead. Birds and small critters will need all the nutrition they can get before Winter will arrive in New England. Most birds have left for the South, where they will over-winter until Spring comes back.
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𝑩𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒌 𝑪𝒂𝒕
Good things happen when this cat crosses your path. A complex blend of wood, citrus, and musk creates a bright freshness.
Top: Spicy Cinnamon
Mid: Clove
Base: Cedar, Frankincense
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This was Katelynn’s First Halloween. She was only 27 days old when I carved the Kitty pumpkin for her. The story behind the pumpkin itself can be found here under this link:
https://underthewhiteoakleaves.com/2022/10/01/my-jack-o-lanterns-2003-2007/
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Katelynn was at the Flower Mound Pumpkin Patch for the first time. Oh, she had so much fun playing with the straw. Kevin and I had to fish it out of her clothes later, She was so busy throwing the straw in the air, it went everywhere. The next day, we dressed her up as a lamb. I made the costume myself. The head was a bit big for her. She enjoyed going to Trick-or-Treat with it.
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It was the first year, we celebrated Halloween at our new house. I made a DIY-Diddlina candy bag for all the goodies, we would receive from going to Trick-or-Treat. On the other hand, Katelynn was still little and a bit unsure, if she really liked this whole “Trick-or-Treat” thing. When we walked from door to door, she wasn’t very happy. Once she had some candy, it wasn’t near as bad anymore. But she did not like the door-to-door walk at all. A year later, this would be a whole other story. …
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… to be continued …
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While Hurricane Ian was causing a lot of damage in the Caribbean, Florida, and Carolinas, it began to fall apart as a tropical storm in Virginia last week. Now, the remnants of Ian linger in the northeast causing temperatures to drop, high winds, and a lot of rain for the last three days and nights. I’m tired of the rain. Tomorrow, the weather is supposed to warm up into the low 70s with some sunshine. This will hopefully be a much better opportunity for some Autumn photos.
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A couple of years ago I was so excited when my Halloween Kringle Candles arrived in Texas. In mid-July 2020, the Kringle Candle Company had a special sale for their Halloween Kringle Tumblers. I believe, they could be ordered only for several hours before the sale was over. Kringle Candle Co. had different Halloween candles later in the year, but I wanted to get my fingers on those black tumbler candles. In July of that year, I got an email from them saying when they have the sale ready for the Kringle tumblers. Me being crazy for Halloween and candles had to go for that deal. The online store had plenty of selections to choose from them. However, I went for four different scents and purchased six candles in total.
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The original founder of the Kringle Candle Co. was no other than Michael Kittredge II himself. He was also the founder of the Yankee Candle Co., which is in business since 1969. After almost thirty years of selling candles all over the world, Michael Kittredge II sold the Yankee Candle Co. to Forstmann, Little & Co. back in 1998. Michael Kittredge II retired from candle making.
In 2008 Michael Kittredge III, the son of the Yankee Candle Co. founder, made his own first candle. And it came naturally to him to make and sell candles himself. In 2009 the Kringle Candle Co. was born and has the flagship store with the candle factory/packing and shipping on an 18,000 sqft. property in Bernardston, Massachusetts. Over 10 years later, the company is still in business, growing its product line and sending the candles all over the United States. Many of the Kringle Candles can be also outside the USA.
Unfortunately, Michael Kittredge passed away due to cancer in Boston on July 24, 2019. He was 67 years old. May he rest in peace. And we are thankful for the millions of amazing-smelling candles over the past 50+ years.
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