Valerean

Summer is over now (sob) and Autumn has arrived. What do I like about it? Not much. Okay, what do I have to look forward to? Halloween. Halloween was a lot of fun last year, thanks to the costuming of my thrifted stuffies, and really, I've always liked it. I'm planning to make more pumpkins that I could turn into Jack-o-lanterns, but I'm also looking for a fun Halloween sewing project to make as well. I like how the skies turn beautiful this time of year, and the cooler temps allow me and my guy to spend more time outdoors. That will help me avoid all the pumpkin spice things. We don't get a lot of autumn leaves here in the humid sub-tropical zone of Central Florida, but my little Japanese miniature maple does turn red some years. It looks like Nature and Halloween are going to have to carry me through this season. Could be worse -- could be Christmas. :)

I've taken a bunch more photos of the mushrooms I encounter on my daily walks with the dogs, and since I'm not getting tired of this, I'm putting them in an online album here if you want to see.

Each morning and evening when I walk the dogs I've been noticing delicate white mushrooms springing up along the roadside. They seem to bud, bloom and wither in 24 hours, which intrigued me. I did a search and discovered they could be Bolbitus Titubans , or Yellow Fieldcap mushrooms. Not poisonous, not really edible, and one of the shortest fruiting mushrooms that appear after rain in pastures and where there is deadfall. All that fits. They do look like fried eggs on top of their very skinny stems. Every time I see mushrooms I'm reminded of how little I know about them, so I've started looking them up online to see if I can tentatively identify them. Of course you should never eat a mushroom you don't know 100% for sure is edible, and I wouldn't (not a fan of eating them, actually), but I am fascinated by how many varieties of mushrooms there are here. It's fun to see if I can find a match for what grows around our home.

Living in the country means you never know what you might encounter along the way when you're out walking. Last week I spotted this across the street while I was walking Beau, and the glint of gold in the sunlight made me get my camera to bring with me on Shadow's walk. These are two golden silk orb weaver (Trichonephila clavipes), also known as banana spiders. These little guys are everywhere now; they build their webs at night and tear them down just after sunrise. Two of them had spun webs that together reached at least ten feet across and maybe seven or eight feet high, and I've never seen two of them so close to each other. The only reason I saw these was that I got up early that day walked the dogs about two hours earlier than usual. Nature is awesome. :)

My guy and I saw this local fisherman when we went on a hike by one of the local lakes last week. If you'd like to see what else we did, check out my album of pics here .