I have this unreasonable – not dread exactly – worry maybe about the approach of winter. I have to keep reminding myself that there are still colors in the winter. I will find them… I know I will! But I keep thinking “the monochrome is coming the monochrome is coming!” and I run around madly trying to glue all of the fall color – every leaf – to my mind’s eye for safe keeping. Good thing I have a camera.

This morning I startled a deer and he hightailed it (Hey! so that’s where that expression comes from!) across the great lawn before I could unholster my camera. Quick Draw McGraw I’m not.

The Maidenhair tree (Gingko biloba) was looking especially gorgeous today so I went in for a close up forgetting the vomit smelling fruit underfoot… Oh well. To me, the picture’s worth a 1000 stinks.

The Franklinia is exhibiting a delicate range of colors – it’s hard to believe this beauty is extinct in the wild – Thank goodness it’s not gone forever from our gardens too. (Plant one!)

The Tupelo is almost done.

But the maples still have a ways to go…

And I bid a fond farewell today to my favorite cutting garden plant (Asclepias physocarpa ‘Oscar’) and some Salvia vanhoutiis (carted off in a red hat lady color combo) from the Idea Beds. Our killing frost is forecast for tonight…