Autumnal Equinox

Tuesday, September 22, is the first day of fall or the Autumnal Equinox. The day is as long as the night and as September progresses the days will become shorter and the nights longer until December when we have the shortest day and the longest night and the days start getting longer again.

Each year, the first of September finds me thinking about Fall Decorations but what with Labor Day and other late summer activities, the best laid plans . . . .

And then, I realize (egads) that it is truly fall and decorations must be gotten out. One cannot have summer decorations out in fall any more than one can have Christmas decorations for Valentine's!

My decorations are simple -- pumpkins, gourds, branches of bittersweet and fall colored leaves. Perhaps some pheasant feathers.

But these are only half of the fall decorations, for come early October, the plants come in -- that is the final fall (and winter) decoration.

The big blue and white vase and big blue and white ginger jar on the mantle hold leaves and bittersweet in fall. At Christmas they hold branches of greenery and in spring, pussy willow and forsythia. You can tell the season by what are in these vases.

The blackamoors on the mantle were an estate sale find. I paid more for them than I usually do for an estate sale pretty but I had just gotten a new Charles Faudree book and he had blackamoors . . . and there they were. Home to Linderhof they came and they've been on the mantle ever since.

Imagine my surprise this weekend when the newest issue of Traditional Home magazine came and in one of the featured homes were the exact same blackamoors. Found at a Paris flea market the article said. I think I found a treasure and are certainly worth the $30 I paid for them!

The bowls of summer potpourri are replaced with pumpkins. These are faux. Sparkly and green -- they add a nice shimmer. I've had them forever -- bought long long ago at Hobby Lobby and whenever I go through fall decorations, these little guys always make the cut.

At the foot of the stairs is a table and a cloisonne bowl. Filled with leaves and bittersweet and feathers, it makes a statement for fall.

The breakfast room has it's own blue and white bowl. Filled with pumpkins both stripe and orange ones.
A bouquet of garden flowers are sometimes picked and placed in a vase next to the pumpkin bowl.
Another blue and white bowl -- this one bigger and Asian rather than English. Filled with pumpkis and gourds and sprigs of bittersweet.
A gauzy tablecloth with autumn leaves add to the feeling of fall.
On the sideboard, the big blue and white vase holds more bittersweet and leaves. I've been eyeing some purply blue berries to add to this arrangement. I think it will be a great addition!

I don't add fall to the dining room mantle, but the pumpkins and gourds on the dining room table and the leaves and bittersweet on the sideboard says fall.

The front porch welcomes our guests and so it needs to feel like fall as well. Pumpkins and gourds and bittersweet in a basket as well as the hurricane that lives on the porch is just the touch of fall that the porch table needs.

And the glass topped iron table with the iron urns filled with fall leaves and the big pumpkin bought 3 years ago for a pittance because it was almost Thanksgiving.

The little gnome is always on the table -- an early marriage purchase -- it now has great patina. We both like to read and what better souvenier than a bookish gnome!

The colors of fall seem to go well at Linderhof. We enjoy decorating for the season and after Christmas, fall is probably our favorite.

I'm ready now for the Autumnal Equinox tomorrow. Linderhof is finally clad in her fall finery -- both inside and out.

Please join me at Rose Colored Glasses for a Welcome Fall Party. It's always so much fun to see what everyone else is doing to decorate for fall.