Blessed is the Blackberry!

This morning, as I walked outside towards the Beech hedge, I sensed a warm thrill of anticipation, our two little pooches  were chasing the fallen Autumnal leaves - & each other - on route towards their destination for their defecations.  .. talking of which I am still constantly retching with every poop I have to scoop!!

Autumn already feels inspiring, the present preparing for the newness of all yet to come. The leaves of many glorious colours to fall in spectacular decay, the silhouettes of the trees  due patiently to soon stand bare against the horizon, braving all elements until their new lush green coats burst into life in the Spring. How exciting, the phases & cycles of all nature - its seasons are simply magical. 

Wild blackberries :) 

Today, we walked the pups again on their little walking leads. Twizel is the most responsive, walking so very well next to our legs. Kyloe is naturally fast, no matter how fast I walk or run, she wants to go faster.  Often we all end up in many twister style tangles. It certainly takes us a lot longer to walk to the meadow, so many delights & distractions on route. So many friendly people wanting to meet the pups. The wee girls respond in great enthusiasm, lots of tummy tickles accompanied by plenty of praise. Eventually, when we reached the meadow we decided to immediately release them from their walking leads to encourage them to walk with us. This they do, amazingly - luckily - so well, if we turn to walk the opposite way they turn & follow, most reassuringly they follow our every move. After a little while we spotted a large leggy Collie, beautiful looking dog but must've appeared to the pups rather like a giant dinosaur as to us he looked ginormous, more so in comparison to our little ones. We were introduced to Mr Pippin, his long copper brown, black & white fur immaculately curled & draped so beautifully. What a handsome boy! He liked the pups and after a few minutes wanted to play with them. He pounced in a playful manner, which unfortunately scared little Kyloe so much, she yelped & tore off in the opposite direction, anywhere other than where Mr Pippin stood, his seemingly extra long hind legs straight with his front paws bent down to the ground his tyrannosaurus like jaw opening, bottoms up style, all in such graceful play mode. Twizel, hearing her little sister yelp so fearfully & loudly,  yelped fearfully too & tore as fast as she could towards me, scrambling up my legs as if yapping "pick me up pick me up!!"  Hubs caught up with Kyloe, calming her down & picking her up - Twizel who was already in my arms was calming down. Poor Mr Pippin will have to wait to play, perhaps another day, hopefully soon as the pups become more confident. As Mr Pippin & his owner glided off into the sunset we walked around the perimeter of the meadow, even the thorns & harvest chiggers didnt put us off collecting the most beautiful plump juicy blackberries. wow, what an abundance. Arriving home with our large colander absolutely full to the brim. Mmmmmmm lots of apple will accompany the blackberries to create the most tasty crumbles. Yaaaaaay for Seasons, yaaaaay for blackberries. Delicious!!! After a lovely roast pork dinner we enjoyed the most freshly made, deliciously juicy & tasty hot apple & blackberry crumble served with chilled thick double cream .. . oooh my,  good job seasons are temporary! May even try to like sloe gin, noticing the amount of sloe berries are equally as prolific. Think we'll be walking the pups around the meadow daily not just for the fun - natures supermarket!! :)