Summer Comes to a Close

I know it is really still summer since we have yet to pass the equinox, but I think most Americans equate Labor Day weekend with the end of summer.  And to be honest, it has really felt like fall outside for several days.  This Labor Day weekend was year #20 for us having a big family and friends get-together on Saturday.  This year was what I think of as our first real  rain-out.  Yes we still had lots of family (12 overnight Saturday) and a few friends and we still played cornhole (in the poly-shelter) and volleyball (in the agility field in the rain), but there was a steady, light rain pretty much all day

An overnight storm knocked down the volleyball net

on Saturday, which kept a lot of us inside.  

But we had plenty of food and drinks and a lot of laughter and fun.  Sunday was a beautiful day and we headed up to the pond for some zip-lining and swimming before some of the family had to leave and then the rest of us finished up the day with pizza followed by s'mores around a fire.

On Monday the last of our family guests departed for home and it got very quiet as it always does.  The temperatures have stayed cool, with the high for today forecast to be only in the mid 60's and an overnight temperature in the upper 40's.  We are supposed to stay cooler than average for the next several days. 

I still have tomatoes in the garden, but not many.  I planted a new crop of lettuce, arugula, and kale, some of which is coming up .

The pumpkins and squash are taking over the garden, which is usual for this time of year, though I will have a lot more pumpkin than I have had in the past.  There are a lot of them out there.

These are just a few of the many pumpkins on the vines.









 

Coming up next weekend is the Wool Gathering  Fiber Festival in Yellow Springs.  Since I last posted I have dyed a couple more colors of alpaca/wool yarn.

I plan to dye at least 2 more colors before next weekend.





 


I also finished my second Mother Bear charity knit for this summer and both have been mailed off.







And I have 4 woven pillows almost complete, I just need to do the final finishing of the last one.  Two are this light color and the other two are the same background color with a darker pattern color.  I am really pleased with how these have turned out. 

I am knitting a small project with some of my recent hand-dyed yarn which I plan to have finished to use as a sample in my booth next weekend.  It is a neck warmer/cowl pattern 
 called Midsummer Haze  and I am using the blue tonal yarn I showed in my previous post.  I think the pattern and yarn are working very well together.