Oh, how I love to rake leaves--NOT!

Over the weekend, Mr. Ivy and I drove through Central New York and admired the brilliant colors--spectacular oranges and reds stood out against the evergreens and deep blue sky.  Just gorgeous.  Lots of the best trees weren't in the woods, but in regular people's yards.  And ya know what happens when they fall?  Someone is gonna have to rake them up.

Why is it that TV commercials (and usually for some kind of pain reliever) try to convince us that raking leaves is fun?  It's not.  It's back-breaking work.  Yesterday I raked a bunch of leaves.  Mostly, I dragged them.  Hubby walked around the yard (about a million times), with the proton pack (otherwise known as a leaf blower) and herded the leaves into BIG, l-o-n-g piles, while I raked them onto a long green tarp, and dragged them around the side of the house, through the backyard and into the field behind us.
E-I-G-H-T-E-E-N times.

Okay, it was my idea to rake the stupid things.  I figured if it rained (and it looked like it might), it would be a lot harder trying to scrape wet leaves off the grass--or worse, try to find any grass under the wet leaves come spring.  So, out we went to take care of the leaf problem.

Two hours later . . .

To reward myself afterwards, I decided to take care of the catnip crop.  More fun!  Years ago, we decided to buy a catnip plant to give our guys a treat.  Since then, that one little plant has produced hundreds of children scattered around the yard.  To some people, catnip is nothing more than a weed, but to our cat, Buster, it's his drug of choice.  And we are his enablers.

A few weeks back, I went around the yard and rounded up all the plants.  I put them in the garage to dry and have been meaning to do something with the leaves.  Yesterday was the day.

Buster came out into the enclosed porch, while I ripped the leaves from the stalks outside on the picnic table.  A lot of catnip dust flew into the air, and Buster tried to jump through the screen to get it.  While I did the harvesting, a bumble bee paid me a visit, sitting on the watering can.  It was in the 50s, and Mr. Bee was quite tired (and probably cold).  He rested for a while, and we conversed, then he flew off, hopefully for home.

Like my beans, this catnip crop was stellar.  We've got more than enough to last the winter . . . uh, unless Buster learns how to open Tupperware.

Oh, and guess what:  it rained all night.  We got those leaves up just in time.

Have you done your raking yet?