This week...

...was pink tutus and birthday parties, long country drives in the evening sunshine and late nights around the fire, colored candles and trillions of stars, frost and early morning fog, fishing and annual family photos...

Fall in Columbus Circle...? 

Beautiful. As my photos from last year attest.

Fall in our own personal yard this year...? 

Not so picturesque. 

Everything is looking kind of...well...scruffy. Unkempt. Rough.

The 60+ Hostas we divided and transplanted in early September are limp and yellowing. 

The garden plot I tilled, fertilized, planted and faithfully tended finally and sadly succumbed to the toxicity of our yard's soil. (Courtesy of our neighbor's towering Black Walnut tree.) And it is now a barren patch of dirt. 

Our raspberries are gangly and sparse.

 Our mulch is a topographical relief map of holes, hundreds and thousands of holes. (Again, courtesy of our neighbor's towering Black Walnut tree and the hundreds and thousands of squirrels it attracts.) 

Enormous spiderwebs and equally enormous spiders festoon every corner and crevice and overhang, wasps swarm to any and every available drop of water and in general you get the sense that everything is longing for winter. 

To be put out of it's misery. 

And given a break. 

And that includes us.

But for now yard work abounds. My hope is to have things tidied up by Halloween. A rather, at this point at least, seemingly daunting prospect. (I think I will leave the spiderwebs perhaps...)

However, lest I sound too, too, "woe is me" and depressing here are pictures of a few of the literal bright spots that yet remain. Determined. Intrepid. Thriving amid the slow downhill descent of Autumn.

Enjoy!

This week...

...was lunch dates and the start of Kindergarten, late night walks in the rain and clouds of blackbirds, morning thunderstorms and luminous full moons, thoughts of pumpkins and plans for Halloween...

SPooN & LeVeL

Sometimes, on a windy, rainy, stormy day. . . when tree limbs and black walnuts and insulation panels are falling from the sky, when soccer practice is cancelled after only 30 minutes and yet getting out of the parking lot to go home takes 40 minutes, when it's been a week and half and you have no working washing machine and everyone is running low on clean clothes. . . you need a brownie.

And not just any brownie. 

A dense, rich, chewy, gooey brownie.

One that the below recipe can deliver.

Whip up a late night batch of these and let me assure you things start to look so much better.

Now for my-to-be-expected recipe alterations: I used coconut oil in place of butter for the brownie batter and coconut butter for the caramel. I also added a small amount of vanilla in each. I did not put Bourbon in the brownies. (Though, it being THAT kind of day, I might of, had there been any on hand.) Instead I used 5 Tbsp of strong brewed Chai tea. I used Cocoa nibs instead of chocolate chips, cornstarch-free baking powder and coconut sugar. And I ended up doing a kind of "poke cake" thing with the caramel sauce. I pierced the top of the still warm brownie with a wooden skewer and then poured the also still warm caramel sauce over it. After that I chilled the whole thing in the fridge. (The  freezer works, too.) Don't get me wrong. It's lovely to eat warm. But like I said, I was after something dense and chewy. For that, you need to be patient (I know, I know...your late night will get later...) and let it spend some time resting and cooling so the coconut oil and coconut butter can get firm again.

After that...get a fork and go to town!

http://realsustenance.com/bourbon-fudge-ripple-brownies-glutengraineggdairy-free/

This week...

...was homemade chicken soup and many pots of honey Chamomile tea, long phone conversations and answered prayers, morning glories twining around everything and rose petals in the grass, overdue rainy days and that crisp, bright, autumnal chill in the air...

This week...

...was soccer practices and football games, the first Maple leaves falling and lots of yard work, anniversaries and sweet out of state visitors, golden corn fields and flocking geese...

This week...

...was hot days and the constant hum of the AC, homemade vanilla-maple ice cream and daddy/daughter dates, sewing projects and late-night-adventure walks, crispy waffles and tomatoes from our garden, collecting wildflower seeds and lemonade stands, fireworks and still more end of summer parties...