grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

  • Home
  • About
  • Media
  • Crafts
  • Farm
  • Food
  • Garden
  • Reading & Books
  • Sunday Letter
  • SHOP!

the Halloween Garden

October 10, 2017 By Talya Tate Boerner 2 Comments

The Halloween Garden

Halloween is one of my favorite times of year. I love the nostalgia of it and dressing in a costume. Halloween provides the perfect excuse to eat a handful of sugary candy I don’t otherwise eat. My silver service on the sideboard looks appropriately dark and moody in its currently tarnished state. Even the yard gets in on the spirit of the season, which brings me to the Halloween garden. Maybe it’s simply my perspective come October, but flowers and plants take on a heavy, sleepy, Halloween-ish air to me. And it all happens naturally. Without the gardener doing anything.

Other than noticing.

I snapped a few pictures to show you the raw beauty of the Halloween garden.

Halloween Coneflowers

Seeds practically jump from dried coneflower pod to soil. Birds like to perch and get their fill so everyone is content.

dried coneflowers - my halloween garden

Milkweed in Fall

During October, milkweed pods begin to split open. The wind sends seeds sailing on ghostly fluff. These seeds, scattered by Mother Nature, have a better chance of germinating than those we plant in spring. It’s like they sense winter and are able to time their growth perfectly.

milkweed in the garden

Skeleton Daylily

What happens if you leave daylilies in the garden to dry all summer and into fall? They morph into exquisite skeletons.

Daylily in October

Oakleaf Hydrangea

By October, the showy pink flowers of this gigantic oakleaf hydrangea have dried to nut brown. The stems would make a fabulous fall indoor arrangement, but since this particular hydrangea grows at the Headquarters House, I’ll resist cutting a few.

Hydrangea in fall

Purple Sweet Potato Vine

Purple sweet potato vine, so dark the leaves are nearly black, is a perfectly sullen and broody Halloween window box plant. Don’t you think? (Also, Headquarters House.)

sweet potato vine

 

Blood Red Cockscomb

Rich cockscomb adds a flash of color and beauty in the fall garden. Think vampires in black tuxedos with velvet fuchsia pocket squares.

cockscomb

Gnarly Trees

As leaves turn brittle and drift to the ground, gnarly branches reach out and appear to grab passersby. This is the time of year for wise old trees in the Halloween garden. The more warty and imperfect the better.

gnarly trees

Hyacinth Beans

Beans are symbolic of magic and power, a nod to Jack and the Beanstalk. Harvest. A spiritual resurrection and growth. My brilliant purple hyacinth beans represent lush vines and blooms next spring. How can they not be otherworldly at Halloween?

hyacinth beans

 

What’s growing (or fading) in your Halloween garden?

Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

[tweetthis]What’s growing in your Halloween garden? #nature #nwark [/tweetthis]

Musical Pairing:
Go To Sleep You Little Baby – Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch, Alison Krauss

 

Filed Under: Gardening, Holiday, Nature & Seasons Tagged With: fall gardening, Halloween, Northwest Arkansas

Wanna receive my monthly Newsletter? Sign up here!

Comments

  1. marthajaneorlando says

    October 12, 2017 at 7:55 am

    Love your “haunted” garden, Talya! You certainly put me in the Halloween mode. Blessings!

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      October 17, 2017 at 8:27 am

      Thank you Martha!

      Reply

COMMENT: Cancel reply

Talya Tate Boerner


Hi! I'm Talya. Writer, Reader, Arkansas Master Naturalist / Master Gardener, Baylor graduate. Author of

THE ACCIDENTAL SALVATION OF GRACIE LEE

and

GENE, EVERYWHERE: a life-changing visit from my father-in-law


Click to BUY NOW!

Gene, Everywhere

Never miss a blog post! Subscribe via email:

Receive my not-very-regular Newsletter?

Most Popular Posts…

  • Yum Yum Cake - old southern recipe!
  • Sunday Letter: 06.19.22
  • Homepage
  • How to Create a Certified Monarch Waystation
  • How to Repot an Orchid

Most Recent

  • Sunday Letter: 06.19.22
  • Sunday Letter: 06.12.22
  • Book Reviews: April / May 2022
  • Sunday Letter: 05.29.22
  • Notes from a Garden Tour

Grace Grits index

Prior Posts

Search Categories

Tags

A to Z April Blog Challenge Autumn BAT Book Reviews childhood Christmas creative writing prompt Dallas Desserts Eureka Springs Fall Fayetteville Food Gracie Lee Halloween Hemingway-Pfeiffer home humor Johnson Family Keiser Lake Norfork Lucy and Annabelle Mississippi County Mississippi Delta moving Munger Place Nana nature Northeast Arkansas Northwest Arkansas Osceola poem Reading Schnauzer simple living simple things spring spring gardening Summer sunday letter Talya Tate Boerner novel The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee Thomas Tate Winter Wordless Wednesday
Follow on Bloglovin

Food. Farm. Garden. Life.

THANKS FOR READING!

All content and photos Copyright Grace, Grits and Gardening © 2022 ยท Web Hosting By StrataByte