Harvest Apples On My Dining Table And A Little Robert Frost

After completing the Sunflower Chandy this past week, I started putting together something new for my pine farmhouse table that sits below the chandy.  I found this Robert Frost poem a few weeks back and wanted to share it as well.  Hope you enjoy the images and I think the poem is brilliant.

After Apple Picking

by Robert Frost

My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree

Toward heaven still.

And there's a barrel that I didn't fill

Beside it, and there may be two or three

Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.

But I am done with apple-picking now.

Essence of winter sleep is on the night,

The scent of apples; I am drowsing off.

I cannot shake the shimmer from my sight

I got from looking through a pane of glass

I skimmed this morning from the water-trough,

And held against the world of hoary grass.

It melted, and I let it fall and break.

But I was well

Upon my way to sleep before it fell,

And I could tell

What form my dreaming was about to take.

Magnified apples appear and reappear,

Stem end and blossom end,

And every fleck of russet showing clear.

My instep arch not only keeps the ache,

It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.

And I keep hearing from the cellar-bin

That rumbling sound

Of load on load of apples coming in.

For I have had too much

Of apple-picking; I am overtired

Of the great harvest I myself desired.

There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch,

Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall,

For all

That struck the earth,

No matter if not bruised, or spiked with stubble,

Went surely to the cider-apple heap

As of no worth.

One can see what will trouble

This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.

Were he not gone,

The woodchuck could say whether it's like his

Long sleep, as I describe its coming on,

Or just some human sleep.

  

-The End-
Linking to:

Something Is Fowl in My City: How I Get Out Of Trying To Be Like Martha

You can't have chickens in my city.  They just don't allow them. Plain and simple.  I actually looked this up after seeing this amazing chicken coop over at my friend Korrie's blog,  Red Hen Home.  Isn't it adorable?  She made the sign on the front for the person who owns the coop.

I can't have anything else either, just dogs and cats and domesticated birds and they must live inside the house.  No caged pet outside.  Never really put much thought to this.  I mean, it's not like I ever really wanted a chicken coop.  But there are all these totally cool people out there, especially in that super cool state of California raising their own chickens and eating their amazing fresh eggs everyday.  I keep seeing this as I read blogs written by totally hip west coast bloggers.  Seems to be the next great craze.

Guess I am stuck with frying up my own eggs from the grocery or going to the McDonald's just three blocks away for one of their famous Egg McMuffins.  Guess the city muckety mucks weren't too concerned about 'public health' when they aloud Micky Ds to set up shop in our city.  The good news is that I will never aspire to be like Martha Stewart.  Without chickens, I'm just not up to her speed, right?!  Phew! Off the hook!

Well....for today, I will just stick with my three wonderful doggies and 7 finches.  They might not provide me with anything edible, but they do supply me with lots of kisses and song.  What more could I ever want?

I have been working on some autumn tablescapes and will be showing you some of the results soon.
Here is a sneak peek....

-The End-

Sunflower Chandy

September is a 'between time' month.  It's not summer. It's really not yet Fall either.  Even though I live in a tropical location, I have a need to change things up once my teens hit the books.  It just doesn't feel like beach balls and pool floats anymore.  But then again, I am not ready for pumpkins either. 

My solution for this is to put away beachy stuff and incorporate pseudo-harvest items into my decor, like apples, sunflowers and the bees of early autumn.  I don't like to make twice the work on myself, so I consider that in just four short weeks my Halloween decorations are about to appear.  With that in mind, my decorations are more of a staging for more to come.  Take for example my new Fall Chandy Decoration. 

I saw these super neato sunflower napkin rings appear this year at Pier One Imports. The moment they had a sale, I scooped up enough to fit over each light on my dining room chandelier.  If you remember last Spring, I re-did this chandy with spring roses and highlighted it on my blog here.  Now it time for the roses to take a leave and give way to something more appropriate.  Once I saw these sunflowers, I knew they were the autumn replacements.  They will remain here through Thanksgiving as a base.  I will add a little accent of Halloween and then Thanksgiving.  For now, I added a little early autumn bee to the mix. 

I found a neat black and white bee in a book I have, copied it and mounted it on red gingham paper and then back them with brown corrugated paper. (I anticipated being able to the see the backside of the cards and wanted a finished look.) 

I then strung them on a thick jute and simply wound them around the candlestick lights.  Nice finishing touch which didn't take a lot of time and can be switched out come October.

Ignore my hubby's junk pile on the stairs.  (wink)

Nice, quick little 'switcherooy!'  This didn't take a lot of time. It's fresh and gives an immediate feeling of an oncoming autumn season. Come October, the bees will take flight and leave and I will replace them with something fun for Halloween.  For now, let me get outta here before one of these bees stings my @$$ hand. 

-The End-
Linking to: