The tail-end of September

The days are shorter, and the garden is frost-burned around the edges. Nearly all of the cabbages and winter squash have been cut and rolled inside. Hundreds of green tomatoes are out there, slowly blooming toward pink, or orange. Pink or orange is good enough for us – we snatch them off the vines and pile them to ripen in bowls and pans and boxes all over the kitchen. C. keeps a huge pot of tomatoes cooking down on the pink stove, canning them as salsa or spaghetti sauce or plain tomatoes, then filling the pot again. The house smells delicious.

The hay guy came.

His truck didn't fit into the barn.

He says three people can move one of those 1,200-pound bales. We're hoping the children will be up soon to wrestle those things inside – I'm pretty sure they'll fit through the door.