root cellaring for the winter

fall, front yard, tricycles.

I was standing in the kitchen Saturday afternoon, looking out the window, thinking about what I needed to do next.  I had been working on the rental place in the morning, making a bunch of minor repairs, together with my son, who loves being daddy's little helper these days.  We stopped by our community garden plot on the way back, and pulled up all the tomato cages and loaded them into the station wagon.

Then we went for a walk, or a hike- as he called it- through the scrubby patch of forest and weeds and junk next to the railroad tracks that flank the garden.  Then we came home to mom and sis for lunch.

So, I was feeling really accomplished by early afternoon and looking forward to getting into our backyard garden.  Gita saw me looking out the window and read my mind. 

building raised garden beds

raised beds made from repurposed playground lumber- before filling with soil

Apparently people enjoyed the post on building with salvaged things, because that has been one of the most-read posts I have written recently.  I must not be alone in my love of building things from junk- or what others have perceived to be junk- and which I've found to be valuable raw materials for my creations.

A project that I've been working on lately have been some raised garden beds for our rental property in Minneapolis.  If you haven't read earlier posts-  Gita and I bought  a foreclosed building across the river that had been badly neglected by the previous landlord and have been fixing it up for the last two years.  Now, finally, we have it to a point where we can stop doing triage, and can do fun and aesthetically pleasing things with the building and grounds.  So this fall I'm building raised beds for the tenants.

fall in saint paul

the maples of saratoga avenue, near our home

There are some things that pay no attention to the economy, the squandering of resources, the political dysfunction of the nation, even the changing climate.

I pay attention to those things, but nature doesn't so much.  The fall colors this year, in spite of the deepening drought, are gorgeous.  The conventional wisdom was that they were supposed to be dull due to the dry weather, which has set in in during the last half of the summer.