Gosh; another year has gone by

I was looking back over some of my posts on this blog when I realized that yet another year had sped by. Time flies when you're having fun; to coin a phrase. And we are having fun. Its been a great year. I do love France and the living here. We're looking forward to an influx of friends who are coming to visit. Three more groups, we've just had new friends for a couple of days, starting on Friday. They're well trained and know that October is probably the best time to come.

Fall is definitely here, the leaves are changing, the wild plums & the blackberries have finished and the roads are quiet again. An unusual year this though; I've had to keep mowing the lawn (well. meadow grass that I mow & pretend is lawn) ever since April. Normally the grass quits growing & turns brown in late June, but not this year. It has stayed green right through & is still growing. Still the nights have drawn in and we'll go off of summer time soon. Temperatures are milder and I'll soon start using the wood burner for the ambiance in the evenings.

Importantly, I've seen field mushrooms twice so far, no three times as I saw some this morning. Didn't pick any as we're going out to a repas today, but I'm hoping for tomorrow or Friday so I can cook some for our first arriving friend. Friday afternoon Michael & I are going walking with rucksacks we'll focus upon apples, quinces and mushrooms plus, maybe, a few pears. Next week we think it will be about right for walnut gathering. Right now some are dropping from exposed trees, but others (like our own tree) aren't quite ready.

Since I wrote the above yesterday it has rained and that has caused our walnuts to drop. Roop & I scrambled for them and I got a good basket full. We need more so maybe Michael and I will move our gathering expedition up a week. No mushrooms this morning even though I thought the conditions should have been right. I'm still hoping for tomorrow when our friend arrives.

In any case I'm enjoying autumn and looking forward to our friends visits over the next weeks. More soon as I must write about yesterday's repas.