Outdoors in the Fall

We really love fall.  Malachi and Lydia were so excited to introduce Gyunay to jumping into the leaf pile.  He absolutely loved it!

Lydia is on the stump that has served as their leaf-pile launching pad for several years.  It is significantly smaller now, though, as it continues to decompose.

I've also done a little gardening lately.  First, my mushroom "garden":

Nathaniel cut down some trees that were either dying or in places where they couldn't stay.  We used a maple and a small oak for the mushroom garden.   Nathaniel then drilled the holes for me, and I "planted" shitake and lion's mane mushroom plugs in these logs. 

Lydia helped me cover the plugs with melted beeswax.  Now we just wait until next year, and hopefully we will have lots of home-grown mushrooms.  And I do mean lots; I put in 200 plugs.

I also planted garlic for the first time.  It's another "plant it and leave it" project that will hopefully produce garlic scapes in spring and actual garlic in July.  Oh, how happy I would be to have my own garlic and mushrooms.

I also planted some daffodil bulbs.  The squirrels and deer have eaten a number of the flower bulbs that used to be all over the front by the pond.  I hope they don't eat all of the new ones.  I do expect to lose a few, but I hope some of them make it and bloom this spring.