Pumpkin Spice Season Is Creeping In 

   I always enjoy this time of year.   Fall coming to East Tennessee is certainly different than it is when I lived in Virginia.    Virginia Fall is more predictable.  Colder temperatures tend to come and stay.  Getting out the cold weather gear is a more sure bet.   End of August in Virginia means finishing your garden and putting it to bed for the year.    Pools close after  Labor Day weekend.   School starts later in the season.   I was used to pulling up all my annual flowers and discarding them.  I'd put out the traditional cold weather flowers such as pansies, chrysanthemums,  and flowering cabbages.  

    It took me about a decade of living in East Tennessee to figure out the differences and accept them. 

Here it is far enough south and mild enough that begonias, snap dragons, elephant ear, mandevilla, dipladena tropical plants  are part of the Autumn color scheme.   I now embrace this fully and rather enjoy it!   I own very few sweaters for I'd roast wearing them.   Temperatures stay mild into November.    We're often still swimming until the second week of October.   Fall Break around October first means a second Summer because we go to Panama City Beach.   It feels nice to have a little sun tan for a few extra weeks.  Gardens may still be producing down here.  Rosemary Winters over here!  

  We are still eating meals outside on the screen porch well into November.  All these things have spoiled us silly.  We do not want to go back to the colder temperatures in Virginia. The older I get the more my joints appreciate the warmer temperatures.  

 Yes, I love pumpkin spice creamer!   I don't buy pumpkins until mid October because they can rot. 

    I have no regrets about moving or the differences.    It is great having four seasons, but less extremes!

Below: new table art from Shops at Home Spun. The truck lights and bonfire are lit by battery power! 

Below: First pumpkin spice coffee of the season. 

Below: Cooler mornings and beautiful dawn of the day. 

Above:  redid the sea grass chair and put a pashmina out there for throwing around my shoulders

Above: I still plant pansies, but other things too. 

  

Below:  The cooler temperatures of early Fall motivate me to do fixer upper projects I've been putting off.  I refinished our pretty Santa Fe table on the screen porch.  I also got a different lamp that wouldn't topple over every time we get the least bit of wind.  

Above:  My begonias as an example of tropicals staying well into Fall.  I loved the tiny hummingbird feeder I found to put in hanging baskets.  

Below: Fall in this area means red morning glory time! There is a patch of disturbed red dirt at Heritage High School that is covered in these! 

Below: Pixie moss in a log shaped planter with fossils

  

Below: I had a bumblebee tomato come up volunteer from last year's plant.  They are like German Striped tomatoes (yellow and red) when they are ripe, but they are tiny like a cherry tomato. 

Below: the raised bed frames were a gift from my parental units.   Thanks Mom & Dad!  I like them and I love you! 

I have grasses, sweet basil, begonias, sage, two more volunteer cherry tomato plants, coleus, alternanthea, and two amaranth plants that came up volunteer.  

Below: Croton plants are synonymous with Fall.  

Below: My bay tree has nasturtiums planted in with it. The bay tree will have to come in before frost.  The nasturtiums I found out do better in cooler weather and poor soil. The portulaca in the pot came up volunteer.  I am forever scattering seeds into pots from whatever is going to see to see what comes of it.  

Below:  lots of colorful flowers for granddaughter Tessa's fairy garden.  

Snap dragons, dianthus, curlytop grass, pixie moss, pansies, violas

Below: a mini blue point juniper shrub with violas, creeping jenny and creeping ficus. 

Below: My lemon grass plant has gotten huge! It is expensive, but I finally found one for $4.97 and it has been worth it.  It is a culinary herb, but I plant it to keep away mosquitoes.  Many of the things I put out repel mosquitos.  I don't have them in my lawn. 

Below: citronella plant.. another attractive plant to keep away mosquitos.  

Below: My garden fountain is still running, but as it gets cold I'll put it away.   Caladiums of pink and green with pink impatiens.   Tropicals are still part of Fall in Tennessee. 

Below: I replaced the table lamp out on the screen porch with a heavier, lower profile one.  One that won't tip over every time we get a breeze.   You can just see "Bad Eyes Barbara" in the far right. My cross eyed bee. 

Below: My sun light.  We bought it at a little shop in Saluda, NC one year on our anniversary trip.  it was in November so it reminds me of Fall.    We enjoy our screen porch more once the temperatures start to cool back down!