Halloween and Spiders

Halloween and Spiders

Halloween is here again. Houses are decorated with witches, pumpkins, ghosts and goblins. And, of course, with spider webs. I coated our front bushes with white webs and put up wire webs on the garage doors. It’s fun to decorate for the holiday.

But Mother Nature outdid all the webs in the neighborhood. A spider worked its way down from the roof of our garage and spun a magnificent web that made my attempts laughable. It anchored the bottom of the web on a bush and then sat in the middle waiting around for a meal to be caught. 

Spider webs are well constructed. The spider has a plan. It mixes non-sticky threads with sticky ones in a symmetrical design. And it does it fairly quickly for such complexity. A spider might be small but don’t diminish its capabilities: it has spider smarts.

The more I observe nature, the more I realize that everything has intelligence. Plants do. Insects do. Animals and birds are pretty darn smart. It may differ from how we think but it is functional for how to survive. If we diminish anything in nature we lessen our own understanding of life.

So on this spooky holiday, when we say WOOOOO, let’s remember it is more than being scary, it is being observant.

A look at web-making:

https://animals.howstuffworks.com/arachnids/spider5.htm

Get to know spiders:

https://daily.jstor.org/surprising-facts-about-spiderwebs/ 

Pumpkins for Halloween and After

Pumpkins for Halloween and After

Halloween is upon us again and there will be lots of dressing up going on – princesses, witches, ghosts, skeletons, you name it. Even pumpkins get a chance to join in with carved or painted faces, decorative decals, wigs, fake ears, googly eyes and expressions that range from funny to frightening.

I prefer to keep my pumpkin uncarved until after the holiday because I have post-Halloween plans for it and don’t want it to spoil; it is food, after all. So, after the big day/night, if you have a pumpkin you might want to use in a different way, one that nourishes and delights without the scary element to it, here are some suggestions:

Remember eating pumpkin seeds as a kid? This is where they came from. Cut off the top of the pumpkin, roll up your sleeves, and dig right in. It’s wet and stringy inside but getting the seeds out is worth it. This is a great job for kids where they can be messy with permission. You can rinse off the seeds or not, your choice. Lay them out on a sheet pan and drizzle them with oil (and salt if you like salty seeds). Bake them in a 225-250 degree oven for about an hour, stirring them occasionally. Check on them periodically. If they seem dry or are beginning to brown, take them out. Cool them down before eating.

Peeling off the skin isn’t easy but it is less difficult when the pumpkin is soft. Cut the pumpkin in half. Scrape out the seeds (if you haven’t already), and turn the halves cut side down on a flat sheet with sides. Add a layer of water to the pan and bake at about 350 degrees for 45 minutes or more (it depends on the size of the pumpkin). When a fork is easily inserted into the skin, remove from the oven and cool. The skin should come off easier now. Mash the pumpkin and use in your favorite recipe.

You may want to use smaller, sweet pumpkins for your recipes instead of the Jack o’ Lantern size. I have used both – and butternut squash as well. The puree from any of them can be used in soups, smoothies, cakes, pies, pancakes, waffles, muffins. If the cooked pumpkin insides are too moist, let the excess moisture drain off in a sieve.

Pumpkin pieces can be baked, steamed, boiled, and microwaved. Use the method that most suits you. I plan to make pumpkin soup, as I do each year. What I don’t use, I freeze, to be used another day, in another way. Enjoy your pumpkin and…

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Here are some great ways to use your pumpkin:

http://allrecipes.com/howto/baking-with-fresh-pumpkin/ 

For some lower-sugar, delicious-sounding recipes:

http://www.yummly.com/recipes/healthy-low-sugar-pumpkin

Pumpkin Patch Near Home

Pumpkin Patch Near Home

I was out on a pumpkin hunt with my grandson, seeing how many pumpkins we could find around the neighborhood. They seemed to be everywhere this time of year, bright symbols of autumn and reminders of Halloween. We found pumpkins on porches, on the steps of the local elementary school, peeking out of windows. And then we came upon a pumpkin patch, in front of a house right in the middle of a block!

I mostly think of a pumpkin patch as being in a farm field, certainly not in a housing development. But there it was, in a space more apt to have small clumps of flowers or seasonal plantings of mums than a pumpkin crop, green vines bearing yellow flowers and orange fruit (yes, a pumpkin is a fruit). 

I asked the owners about it. It seems that they had left a pumpkin outside to feed the rabbits that happened by. The seeds that weren’t eaten planted themselves and now were happily growing. That got me thinking about how life has a way of supporting itself. The plot the pumpkins were growing in wasn’t ideal for the length of the vines but they were thriving nonetheless, a symbol of life’s determination to express itself. We live in a tough world yet the seeds of hope survive, even in the most difficult situations.

The pumpkin patch was a joyful surprise for me and added quite a few pumpkins on my grandson’s hunt. 

(The final count: 61).

This site has just about everything to know about pumpkins, from planting to harvesting to eating. Enjoy!

http://www.allaboutpumpkins.com/growing.html

What’s a fruit, what’s a vegetable?

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/fruit-vegetable-difference/MY02201

Happy (early) Halloween

Mother Nature got an early start on Halloween this year. She didn’t wait for treats and went right to the tricks. An October snowstorm hit the northeast leaving millions without power and, ironically, forcing the cancellation of lots of Halloween festivities. It wasn’t so much of a surprise as the weather people predicted the storm but it still had a quality of the unbelievable about it. We talked about putting away our patio chairs for the season but felt no rush to do it. I was startled to hear the sleet tapping against the window and stayed glued to the spot as I watched the hard pellets of ice slowly turn into the quiet softness of snowflakes. It didn’t stop us from doing morning chores but we did postpone our afternoon activities in preference for sipping cocktails before our first cozy fire.

I can’t say that I blame Mother Nature for playing tricks. In fact, she seems to have been doing it a lot this year with heat waves that stayed around, rain during what is traditionally a dry part of the year, and lack of rain when the crops were begging for moisture. She certainly gets our attention this way. But then we have been playing tricks on her for decades. We pollute her air and much of her water. We continue to cut down the trees in her virgin forests and decrease the supply of oxygen to our planet. We play around with her crops, altering their genetics and changing our definition of food. Is she trying to tell us something in the only way she can? Will we listen?

And yet, Mother Nature still has a heart. Today, on Halloween proper, she sent a glorious, sunny day. It is just the right weather for little ones to come knocking on doors asking for treats. And when night arrives and the older goblins come around, there will only be a slight chill in the air, appropriate for October 31^st.

Check out the Oct.29^th storm: http://www.timesunion.com/photos/slideshow/October-East-Coast-snowstorm-31779.php