All Saints’ Day – Hallowmas

I love it when a Red Letter day falls on a Saturday. The atmosphere is so nice. Busy trams and busy railway station, but it is a slow busyness. Today it is a family day, solemn, but at the same time joyful as families get together to remember loved ones. Hands are full of bouquets of flowers or the traditional arrangements that adorn the graves in cemeteries all over the country.

 

 

A walk amongst the majestic trees in the city's southern cemetery 

 

After a sitting and pondering a bit after bringing flowers for Boss, Anna and my Mum I wandered in the long shadows and the shafts of bright sunshine.

I watched the red squirrels zooming down vertical trunks to snap up an acorn from the ground and stand, as if suddenly turned to stone, amongst the people visiting the graves of loved ones, before vanishing into thin air.  

I smiled as a great tit bathed beside me as I sat on my usual bench for pondering. His flittering back and forth was almost impossible to catch on camera.

Instead I photographed the light playing in the leaves, the blue sky cut in half by fluffy vapour trails, and the toadstools so well camouflaged amongst the fallen leaves that I almost missed seeing them.

Thinking ahead to Christmas

Finally I collected some of the long larch branches that had fallen to the ground in recent storms; I chose those with cones attached, they will decorate my Christmas parcels.

It is difficult to plan for Christmas while walking in the warm sunshine just as it is difficult to plan for spring or summer when the snow is falling. But as I have more than thirty years behind me of planning crafty activities I always have the next project in mind.

Although there are only a four weeks until the first weekend of Advent, bringing with it the opening of our famous Christmas Market, we are still enjoying the fresh air without our winter gloves and scarves and still sitting in the sun at pavement cafes for coffee and cakes!