And then suddenly its here - mid November. It is a grey month and most days are overcast with a thick and heavy blanket of clouds. Within weeks all the leaves will have fallen and the glory of autumn colours are nothing but a memory. And suddenly, in the middle of all the greyness, for one day the clouds parted and we were given the treat of a beautiful sunny day.
I particularly love watching dawn break in winter time. The colours are amazing, so soft with a kaleidoscope of pastel hues intertwined with the greys and browns of withered grasses, reeds and bare branches. A light frost lingers on the ground, giving silver edges to the plants and a sheer shimmer to the world at large.
The details of frosted plants always amaze me. Silver contours in a macroscopic world. I want to get close up and revel in this alternate universe, and I take time to do so. Half an hour later when the sun has reached over the trees it starts to warm up the ground and the frost disaperes.
In the kitchen garden some brave flowers have survived the night, and I pick some of the last of the carrots for dinner. My brussels sprouts seem to have survived the attack of the monster caterpillars and soon I shall pick them too. But not today. Today I simply take time to enjoy the sunshine.
As the garden is bereft of flowering plants this late in autumn it is the perfect time to look at the form and structure of it. Some things work really well, and others not so much. I love the renovated borders at Stensund, where a little stone statue has found its home. Elsewhere old milk canisters are placed amongst plants to slowly decay. A memory of times gone by.
In a corner of my new shrubbery by the garage I have collected all the old birdhouses into a small village. Sometimes I see little mice scurry in and out of them, and in the house on the pole a bird had made her nest last summer.
In the early afternoon I walk home to Humlegård. The days pass so quickly now, with only half days of daylight. It is the time I most often hear friends complain about living this far north, as two thirds of the day is spent in darkness. Most people I know don't like November.
Yet to me it is a good and necessary month; a winding down into winter if you will. Without this transition between the long warm autumn (that has been like an extension to the summer) and the Christmas month coming up next I simply wouldn't feel ready for the festive season.
I hope you have a good week!
