The Autumn Leaves .....

I just love Autumn the colours of the trees are great, the way the sun shines through them and if you're lucky you can see squirrels darting around stocking up their nut supplies.

We have been out and about this week driving around some of the countryside. Part of it involved Motorways ...not very picturesque but necessary to drive on sometimes. Motorways do have their uses but it's far better to take the scenic route as we like to call it, it has far better uplifting qualities.

I find walking in Autumn is far more pleasant than in the too hot summer temperatures and I always enjoy seeing childrens faces when they are crushing leaves, kicking them around or picking up conkers with such great excitement. It's great to see families out together having fun .....I do wish more parents would take time out to enjoy fresh air with their children.We are all guilty at times of being 'cooped up' indoors and not being out in the fresh air.

I find a nice walk can make your next meal taste extra special, do you?  

Have you any plans for some fresh air this weekend?
You may be off to a football match?
My niece plays hockey and quite a few family members go to cheer her on, it's great when she scores a goal,

The Autumn Leaves, a nice walk, and a great tasting casserole, pork or beef ? Anyone got a nice recipe?

All the best Jan

Yes I love the Autumn leaves too, but I also feel sad because Summer has gone and it's a long time till Spring. The squirrels are busy burying their food supplies in our garden. My son (aged 24) is gathering all the conkers he can from the tree next to our gate.......I'm really not sure why he still collects conkers every year, but he does. I do like the cooler temperatures too Jan.

No football matches for us this weekend, but we are planning to go to visit our other son around 5.30 on Saturday, so I can guess which match we might be watching then.

zand wrote:Yes I love the Autumn leaves too, but I also feel sad because Summer has gone and it's a long time till Spring.  The squirrels are busy burying their food supplies in our garden.  My son (aged 24) is gathering all the conkers he can from the tree next to our gate.......I'm really not sure why he still collects conkers every year, but he does.   I do like the cooler temperatures too Jan.

No football matches for us this weekend, but we are planning to go to visit our other son around 5.30 on Saturday, so I can guess which match we might be watching then.

I really enjoy collecting conkers too. Have many happy memories of doing this with the children ....and now the grandchildren.

Can you remember conker battles in the playground? I can but due to health and safety issues I think they may have been banned......they'll be stopping children climbing trees and getting dirty soon !!!!!

Did pick up a few conkers this week and I've made an Autumn Display on one of our side tables .....it looks good (well I think so).

Someone once told me that if you placed conkers around the edge of your rooms you wouldn't get plagued by spiders ....or was it daddy long legs - something like that.

Has anyone else heard of this?

Can't think what match you may be watching tomorrow Zand      

All the best Jan

I've heard they stop spiders and maybe moths too. I'm not sure it's true though?

Hmmmm, yes the match....getting nervous already!

zand wrote:I've heard they stop spiders and maybe moths too.  I'm not sure it's true though?  

Hmmmm, yes the match....getting nervous already!

Ah it was spiders!!

I don't mind spiders but I'm not keen on moths for some reason, they can't harm us can they, seems illogical but that's me on moths.

I love spiders webs on frosty mornings ........

All the best Jan

autumn leaves always remembers of my eldest asking about the leaves and us explaining they are dieing to make way for the baby leaves and her grieving over them, its kinda funny but it was actually very touching, she actually cried her heart out for the dieing leaves hehe

we spend alot of time in the country geocaching

when we was young living on a council estate conkers was a big deal, my dad would take us to the countryside to find conkers and we would spend all day collecting them, we would have bags full, happy days

stop daddy long legs? and how would i be heroic, bravely catching them and returning from the back door triumphant, growwwwl

lol it's me catching the daddy long legs and spiders in this house!

Daddy longlegs, a plague of them in our house - scary!

Oh I love them! I wish I could come and catch them and bring them back here.

Daddy Long Legs ..... not overly keen, wasn't there a book about "Daddy Long Legs" I seem to remember in the back of my mind or was it a film? Anyone know - if not I'll have to consult my friend Mr. Google ...


@Andy "we spend alot of time in the country geocaching" - not heard of this, what is it please?

All the best Jan

Jan1 wrote:


@Andy "we spend alot of time in the country geocaching" - not heard of this, what is it please?

All the best Jan

I'm not too sure what it involves either Jan but I think it's a bit like treasure hunting using GPS (Or something like that)

im glad you asked lol its beyond great, basically....

you make a free account at http://www.geocaching.com/

fellow geocachers hide treasure...well little pots, film cases, lunch boxes, buckets with lids, anything that is weather proof.... at a location in the countryside, town, high street anywhere, your not allow to bury it but it can be hidden up a tree, in a pipe, in a drain thats accessable etc etc, each cache is rate on its terrain 1-5 and difficulty to find 1-5 you can download the app and use a gps on a smart phone via the app or as we did buy a hand held gps, you look at the website decide which one or ones to go after, go to that location, then follow your gps to the longtitude latitude co ordinates, then with 20 feet of the co ordinates the cache is hidden, some are easy some are hard, on the app there are clues if your stuck sometimes and when you find it you record a findit and leave a message, it records how many you found etc and there is always a little book where you sign your name and date it, in the bigger ones there are little things like badges, little toys, soldiers, foreign coins, rubbers there really unusaul things too sometimes a trackable by gps toy which you take to another cache and the person who hid it tracks it around the world, if you take something you have to leave something of equal or greater value, we but those little toys on the shops counters and leave them (even when we dont take) its lovely when the kids find something they want, it can be worthless little thing but they treasure it more than there £500 toys, if you looked i guarentee there would be 1000s in your area, they are all over the world, theres a map on that site, its incredible, most are alone country paths etc out of the way, the only rule is "muggles" which are people not geocaching mustnt see you retrieve it so it is a secret from anyone that isnt geocaching, the other day we was doing puzzle geocache, oh yeah there are puzzle ones where your go to the location to get a clue to the next and there get another clue and so on and some you have to do maths all kind of puzzles some way too hard for us lol but anyway, the other day we had to find a sign on a church the clue was something like 1st line 3rd word 2nd line 5th word and so on, the number of letters in that word was the next coordinate on the long lat gps, you fill out on your notepad and solve the clue to find the cache, its brilliant, free, fun for all ages and fantastic exercise for any level or ability

this geeza is a dick but it gives you an idea

Andy12345 wrote:im glad you asked lol its beyond great, basically....

you make a free account at http://www.geocaching.com/

fellow geocachers hide treasure...well little pots, film cases, lunch boxes, buckets with lids, anything that is weather proof.... at a location in the countryside, town, high street anywhere, your not allow to bury it but it can be hidden up a tree, in a pipe, in a drain thats accessable etc etc, each cache is rate on its terrain 1-5 and difficulty to find 1-5 you can download the app and use a gps on a smart phone via the app or as we did buy a hand held gps, you look at the website decide which one or ones to go after, go to that location, then follow your gps to the longtitude latitude co ordinates, then with 20 feet of the co ordinates the cache is hidden, some are easy some are hard, on the app there are clues if your stuck sometimes and when you find it you record a findit and leave a message, it records how many you found etc and there is always a little book where you sign your name and date it, in the bigger ones there are little things like badges, little toys, soldiers, foreign coins, rubbers there really unusaul things too sometimes a trackable by gps toy which you take to another cache and the person who hid it tracks it around the world, if you take something you have to leave something of equal or greater value, we but those little toys on the shops counters and leave them (even when we dont take) its lovely when the kids find something they want, it can be worthless little thing but they treasure it more than there £500 toys, if you looked i guarentee there would be 1000s in your area, they are all over the world, theres a map on that site, its incredible, most are alone country paths etc out of the way, the only rule is "muggles" which are people not geocaching mustnt see you retrieve it so it is a secret from anyone that isnt geocaching, the other day we was doing  puzzle geocache, oh yeah there are puzzle ones where your go to the location to get a clue to the next and there get another clue and so on and some you have to do maths all kind of puzzles some way too hard for us lol but anyway, the other day we had to find a sign on a church the clue was something like 1st line 3rd word 2nd line 5th word and so on, the number of letters in that word was the next coordinate on the long lat gps, you fill out on your notepad and solve the clue to find the cache, its brilliant, free, fun for all ages and fantastic exercise for any level or ability

Cheers for that mate and that does indeed sound like quite good fun.

Hi Andy - geocaching sounds great fun for all ages and as you say a brilliant way to keep fit, a very good thing for all the family to do ....perhaps a bit more interesting than a walk?

But no matter how we keep fit and exercise if we enjoy it so much the better.

Do you know where it originated?

Have any other members here tried it?

All the best Jan

hi, no i dont know where or who started it but its massive, i do mean massive, millions of caches in nearly all countries, its amazing how many there are, over 6 millions worldwide

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZRBWb6BrpQ

I'd have loved that when I was a kid ! Great, simple idea ! Like it !

Andy12345 wrote:hi, no i dont know where or who started it but its massive, i do mean massive, millions of caches in nearly all countries, its amazing how many there are, over 6 millions worldwide

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZRBWb6BrpQ

I never realised how big, global and popular this is. It sounds great fun and something all could do. What a great activity for all the family to do and take part in.

I looked on Wiki and interested to read that " The first documented placement of a GPS-located cache took place on May 3, 2000, by Dave Ulmer of Beavercreek, Oregon"

Great, to enjoy any time of the year - but the countryside does look good in it's Autumn shades  

All the best Jan

Yes it's still Autumn and we've fast forwarded to 7th October - EEK where do the weeks go to ?

October sees very changeable weather, we're reliably told, but just look out of your window to see!
Yesterday the heavens opened, I got soaked but somehow it was fun - am I mad? No don't answer that  

Today was a totally different one sunshine, blue skies, quite windy - a few showers here and there but somehow I didn't mind. I just like Autumn, I enjoy Autumn ..... and in my coat pocket were a few conkers I'd picked up a few weeks ago whilst previously out in good Autumn weather. I'd also taken a few quick photo's on my phone and they looked ok - for a techno dinosaur that is.

Bet it's good weather for Andy's 'caching' or anyone else who enjoys it.

The grandchildren are making some great paint patterns using leaves they've picked up on walks.
They love it ...... Are you making the most of Autumn?

All the best Jan

See what I have to put up with ? I try to be a pipe wielding hard case and I get all this mellow sweetness and light baloney. Few appreciate what it's like.

I thought this was going to be a thread about Justin Hayward and Forever Autumn. I was disappointed.

It's gone wet and lot cooler here last few days. Sunday night blew a gale from the East and pointed out a few gaps round windows that let in water so Mr E has been using every bit of sunshine left to seal them. It hardly ever blows that direction with us and certainly not with the gusts it did on Sunday so we had never noticed the window recesses getting damp before. At least it meant I could justifiably pop storage heaters on to help dry it. They aren't much use apart from taking background chill off so most of autumn and winter here is spent in extra layers and under thick duvets. I am feeling the cold more this year having lost 3st of padding.

eddie1 wrote:See what I have to put up with ? I try to be a pipe wielding hard case and I get all this mellow sweetness and light baloney. Few appreciate what it's like.

You love it being married to Mary Poppins :-)

Surrounded by trees autumn means lots of bloody leaves to clear up, not my favourite pastime

graham64 wrote:Surrounded by trees autumn means lots of bloody leaves to clear up, not my favourite pastime

Thought of you and others grumbling about this Graham, and I can't say I blame you.

It's true the leaves are everywhere .....going out earlier my windscreen was covered with ???  yes you've guessed it loads of leaves ...well taught me not to park under a tree at this time of year.

All the best Jan

Goodness me the winds sure were blowing hard today and those Autumn leaves came spilling down every where. For a moment it reminded me of a book I read some time ago when the heroine, for some reason I can't remember now, was studying / looking at the way the leaves were blowing around her. Actually if you do take time and watch the leaves - the patterns they make can be quite interesting.......honest they can  

Except when they may have just landed on the patio you'd just swept at the weekend.  

Seriously, the winds have been very strong and unfortunately there have been deaths and accidents reported, trains have been delayed, airlines have postponed some flights etc.

The sort of day when maybe it's just best to stay indoors and put a post on the forum  

How's your Autumn day been?

All the best Jan