Linda's seasonal decorations

Regular readers will know that there are a dozen or more lovely outdoor pots/vases/whatever they're called around the house. In the summer they have flowers in them, mostly annuals, but she has been working hard to overwinter some dahlias. We won't know how that turns out until spring.

Fall is a tough season for her. She works hard to protect the flowers and give them a few more days if they're still blooming, which is often the case with dahlias. It means covering up the tender plants in the afternoon, and uncovering them in the morning when the frost is gone. Sometimes we find bees huddled in a blossom, waiting it out. We picture a bee taskmaster with a little clipboard sending the bee out on a mission, even when the odds of them returning are small. There are no doubt complex bee calculations involved, and they probably know more about the weather coming than we do. I'd be happy to feed them some of our honey scraps if only I knew how to do that and not mess them up.

But eventually summer and fall ends, and there is no hope anymore, short of a heated greenhouse. Which we don't have. The compost bin gets a workout, and the overwintering experiment begins. But Linda doesn't like to leave the pots bare. She likes to create these beautiful seasonal decorations in the pots.

The whole thing is more difficult than you'd think. Supply chain issues restrict quantities of the boughs she wants. One store might have hundreds, the next of the same brand might have none. Then there's getting weather nice enough to work outside in, which is a crapshoot this time of year. Or getting weather that doesn't freeze the soil in the pots solid before the boughs arrive. One year she was seriously thinking about send me out to rent a jackhammer.

And then the creative difficulties, splitting up the various supplies between the various pots to achieve the effect in her mind. As I write this, she is nearly done. So close. Maybe today. I've been out several times to capture photos. Once complete I'll update and post. These should be in the order taken and there could be several of each pot taken from different angles. I'll pass on Of the Day, since you've already scrolled through a great many photos by the time you get there.

So if you're not interested in seasonal decorating, stop reading now and go onto whatever is next in your life. If you are interested, get your favourite tipple, scroll, and enjoy.

Some of the raw materials.

These might still be a work in progress. There might be additional tweaks to some of the other pots to use up the last of the materials, or to balance things out, or to satisfy Linda's sense of The Way It Ought To Be.

These are basic shots. There's no artistic snow or water drops on them, no interesting light. If such should happen, you might well get an update.