Fall is in the air!

It seems that summer is over... fall is here. I can smell it! Today the house is smelling like concord grape juice, a distinct smell, spicy, all it's own, hardly to be described. A friend has a vineyard and last night Abe and the girls brought home a bushel. I have 10 quarts of pure juice cooling on the counter. I was doing pears before that... Somewhere between peaches and pears, summer leaves and fall arrives. Abe said today that he is hungry for chili, a decidedly fall/winter food in my books!
Another tell tale sign is I am finding acorns around the house. No, we don't have a squirrel problem, it's just we have these "squirrely" girls! This summer it was rocks and "fossils". There is one, or a pile, somewhere in almost every room in the house! Now it's acorns... but I love them. The only place we used to find them when I was a kid was in the yard at Grandpa Amoth's house. I pick them up too, but it seems the squirrels are no dummies! They beat you to the nice fat ones!
Abe is in a lull on the farming scene right now... hay is finally D.O.N.E. for the year! Corn harvest is coming... in the meantime this week he is working on putting stones on the house. We are on the "home" stretch now!
We had one short-lived round of minor colds recently, which got me thinking about how to boost the immune systems for the coming season. We do not want a repeat of last year! One thing led to another and I am on the trail of making my own elderberry extract/syrup. Anyone have any suggestions?
I am looking forward to the lazier days of winter. Long evenings... No weeding, picking, snapping, boiling, stirring, cutting, etc. More reading, writing, drinking chai, possibly sewing, etc. Aren't you glad life has it's seasons?! I am. And they rotate frequently enough that you can always look forward to the next one. So much more variety that way! I can't imagine eternal spring, for example. No fall colors would be a deprivation!
The girls had a song playing last night that says, "God is all around us, and He knows best." I have to agree! ( They had a bit of a problem, one loves to go to sleep listening to music, and one loves the quiet. We worked it out that it is quiet one night and music the next. I like that they love music, but I like them to also not be afraid of silence. To many of us run away from things by being always busy or noisy.)
I think I'd better get off here... I will close with this quote I am enjoying recently by a sometimes profound "bear", Winnie the Pooh!
"Never underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can't hear, and NOT BOTHERING. (Emphasis mine.)