Hot Mulled Cider

There definitely has been a chill in the air lately and frost blanketed the grass like new fallen snow. I stopped by the farm market on the way home and picked up a jug of fresh-pressed apple cider. Just felt like a warm cup of mulled cider in my favorite transferware cup, wrapped up in an old quilt with my head in a book by the fireplace. Our Merry Molly's Mulling Spice is back for the season. It is a quick, delicious way to treat yourself to a favorite fall beverage. One package goes a long way. Made with natural spices, fruits,& sugar. Packaged with a lovely 19Th century engraving-you can find it on my website-www.victoriangardengourmet.com.

Happy fall!

Mums The Word

I love fall-the colors, the scent of the woods, fireplaces with that first curl of smoke, apples, pumpkins & spices. Shaking out those wool sweaters from the blanket chest & throws to wrap up in with the scent of lavender sachets still clinging to them. Earthy buckwheat pancakes for breakfast with hot apples, carmelized in maple syrup & hearty baked pumpkin oatmeal. Changing the flowers to the frost-kissed, mop head hydrangeas that I'll dry later to decorate the Christmas tree.

We took a drive in the country to our favorite road side stand for pumpkins & mums to finish decorating. The colors looked like patches in a quilt. It was so hard to decide-but there's only so much room in the car! I love all the funky gourds-especially the ones with all the "warts".

On the way home we stopped for a leg-stretch at the Haldeman Mansion. The Haldeman Mansion, is on the Pennsylvania & National Registers of Historic places. It was the birthplace of Professor Samuel Stehman Haldeman and was completed in 1812 by his grandparents, John and Maria Brenneman Haldeman. The style of architecture is vernacular German combined with Federal elements. When it is restored, it will be the first historic structure in the Bainbridge-Conoy Township areas, and will serve as a museum house, community landmark and meeting place. It was a lovely day and perfect for a stroll!

I always get a bit nostalgic this time of year. When my husband & I first went "house hunting" 23 years ago, the first two properties we looked at were stone farmhouses. I love my Victorian-(it is after all my first house), but I am always drawn every fall to a stone house.

Apple Picking

Wednesday was the perfect fall day-the air was crisp, the sky was a brilliant blue, and you needed that jacket or sweater. My Mom has been going to the same orchard for over 20 years-she just celebrated her 84th birthday last month. She and my grandmother and aunt used to go-what a wild bunch that was! Grandma was in her nineties, my aunt her late seventies with mom just a few years behind. Now it is just me and my mom bounching over the country roads our bushel baskets at the ready. We brought home some lovely delicious-(my husband's favorite), some crispin-(they make delightful dumplings) and blush-skinned Jonagold. Couldn't resist a home-baked apple dumpling to take home & more gourds & mums. I just can't help myself!

Made some Orchard fruit dip for the cut-up apples-mmmmm!

Added to the outdoor decorations and in a few spooky weeks it will be Halloween. Time to bring the spiders down from the attic and polish up the silver treat bowl. I wonder if the clock will chime again this year. We bought it at auction four years ago and it never ran. Wound it-jiggled it-nothing. Last year when I was filling the treat bowl the clock started running and went through its repetoire of chimes, ran for half an hour and stopped. Spooky! Whose ghost was it-maybe this year we'll find out! Mickey was not impressed-he continued his afternoon nap on the ottoman.

Fall Decorating

It is so much fun at the start of a new season. Replacing the quiet colors of summer with the rich jewels of fall. I draped the mantles with bittersweet, filled baskets with hydrangea blooms and lavender. Replaced bowl fillers with apples, pears, & gourds. My husband found a perfect, dried gourd, a cast-off from last year. I varnished it. It turned out the most marvelous color like aged stucco. It was such a wonderful surprise that now is part of a still-life on my back-door cupboard. I filled a great, green basket with silk sunflowers, hydrangea & bittersweet to put outside my front door. Poor Pee Wee is just "decorated out". He had to take a qucik cat-nap.