From Judy………By the time you read this, everyone’s fall chores should be done. Wouldn’t that be nice….with one exception. Winter tires.

Gael likes to set a date in November to do this, often Thanksgiving weekend. I like to be ready for that first snow/freezing rain event. We seem to have had this same discussion for 50 years.

My biggest chore is putting on the storm windows. We have the old wooden ones, take them off in the spring, putting them on in the fall. The trouble with this fall chore, all the windows have to be washed, both sides of the storm windows and the outside of the house windows, and then while I’m at it, the inside of the house windows, all 21 of them. Getting them squeaky clean with no streaks is another problem. I’ve spent years cleaning windows many different ways, only to find smudges on them when looking through them in winter, when it’s too cold to do anything about it. Sharon Fiske put me onto a good cleaning product last year and I love it. It works! A few years ago, we installed those little number button things on the windows and corresponding window sills, which make another problem much easier.

Now that the storm windows are on, I move on to the flower beds. Because of the HOT/DRY summer we’ve had, I was ready to cut the flower beds back weeks ago but it was still too hot for me. If it doesn’t get done this fall, I’ll deal with it in the spring. I do have a list of gardening reminders going for next year because I can’t seem to remember much from year to year.

Then we move on to the wood pile! Our son, Owen, has been a great help this year and had most of it cut and split before black fly season arrived. Now it’s time to move the wood to the porch, but we can’t do it until the porch furniture gets moved to the upstairs of the barn, which we need help doing. Seems to me we need more and more help doing stuff lately! Now it will be time to rake leaves, not my favorite chore. A few years ago, our daughter, Susan, gave Gael a leaf blower for Christmas. It sat around for a while, but Gael got it out one year to see how it works and it does! It takes hours and in the end, you have several huge piles of leaves. Now it’s time to move the great piles of leaves. We used a huge king-size sheet that came from somewhere and that works great, and when done, folds up into a small pile to be put away until next year. Getting the leaves into the truck, driving down the road and depositing the leaves in a meadow is the next step, but an easy one. What to do with the geraniums that are still in bloom!! I usually bring them inside (something in past years I said I wouldn’t ever do again) and water them until they die in March. Some people have good luck keeping them over, but we don’t have a good place to put them, either, it’s too hot, there isn’t any sun or something. Then, come spring of next year, I’ll go to the local greenhouse and I’ll buy new ones in full bloom already.

Lastly, getting out the snow scraper from the back of the car, placing it close to the driver’s seat and making sure the tow rope that I got for Christmas a few years ago is in the car. This was a wonderful gift and I was glad to have it on more than one occasion. I do have a good story about my tow rope that I’ll share with you if you are interested. As of now, none of the above have been done. It’s still too early. But when the weather is right, the big rush is on.