Shades of Orange

I am finally returning to the land of the living after a week of feeling off my game.  Ugh!  Thankfully, I seem to be the only one who has had to live with the funk and hopefully B and the kids have dodged the bullet! 

The beginnings of fall have ushered in some much needed rain that has weighed down the leaves that are still clinging to their branches and caused several to fall and plaster the ground like a first layer of natures paper mache.  This past weekend, B took Charles out to harvest our first batch of pumpkins and winter squash.  Varying shades of orange now adorn the porch in a festive fashion.

From the mere decor of the cornfield pumpkins (larger, tho' the picture doesn't quite do these beauties justice), to the tasty morsels that are the sugar pumpkins (babies) and winter squash (glimpse in back) about half of the pumpkins are now accounted for.

They also picked about half of the butternuts.  Amazingly, these were all super-sized this year and yielded two that were completely pumpkin shaped (one of them above).  You can see a couple little imperfections on the one in front where a diligent squirrel tried to take a taste, but was unsuccessful and the resilient squash healed over.

Fall is filled with many hues of beauty, even the late summer ones merge into the season and fade into the sunset.