Staying Indoors

This is all but a memory now.  The season’s first frost has come and gone so my herb garden now looks like this:

It’s not as glamorous (that is, if you consider a back porch of a pretty hohum condo glamorous) but it should do for the colder months.  I always feel guilty having to pick one herb over another.  I only have room for 4, so I have to go with sentimental plants (that sad bit of mint on the right, for example) or with the heartier ones such as the parsley, oregano and rosemary.  The lemon balm, apple and chocolate mints and basil were left victim to the season’s first frost.

It breaks my heart each and every time.

Those plants I spent all summer long trying to keep alive all look like plants long forgotten at this point.

Wilted.

Wind burned.

Frozen.

Unloved.

Ugh, I can’t event write about it.  I’ll change subjects.

I’m always dumbfounded with how quickly this time of year approaches.  It’s quite possible that I live each and every day in anticipation for this time of year.  I adore the transition into Autumn and then the months of winter that follow.

A fire in the fireplace is my favorite backdrop for quiet evenings spent spinning yarn or cuddled under an heirloom quilt watching a quirky movie.  I love the smell of allspice as it wafts through the house while baking a spur of the moment bread.  I adore the way the late afternoon sun plays amongst the bare limbs of the tree.  And I long for the quiet conversation that awaits me in a field blanketed in frost on my morning drive to work.

I honestly can’t think of a single thing I dislike about the approaching cold months.

I even like darting from the warmth of the shower to the warmth of my quilted bed in order to avoid the cold air of our bedroom late in the evening.

I love all of this much more than sweating in my car while waiting for the light to change during the rush hour traffic heading home after work.

Yes, I’ll gladly put up with shrinking my herb garden if it means the occasional chance of snow is on the way.  What do you love most about the changing seasons?