Time to Close the Cottage for the Season

Closing time at the cottage is bittersweet.

I absolutely love Autumn at the cottage. I like that there are fewer people out on the lake and the quiet that goes with that. I love the changing colours, the birds on their migration routes stopping by the island for a snack of acorns or that sunset time when Canada Geese land in the water in front of the cottage in massive honking mass. We can feel the air pull us forward as they swoop a few feet over our heads and splash into the water.

I love cold evenings as an excuse to light a fire in the fireplace and cuddle to keep warm under a pile of blankets and quilts. I love baking warm dishes in the oven and sipping hot cider on the dock. The last of the smokey bonfires in the backyard turns into last chances to clean up some stray branches in the yard.

Sadly it becomes clear that it really is time to pack up for the year. The cottage is not insulated for year round use and it becomes hard to keep the place warm enough to sleep, even with a roaring fire.
When you wake up and find your water glass has a skim of ice on top you realize that winter is truly on its way. A bigger concern is when you try and turn on the taps and you discover the water in the pipes has become frozen. We have to worry about draining our hot water tank and getting the water pump out of the lake before it becomes frozen and damaged.

We bring in all the furniture and drapes off the porch and bring in the outdoor furniture and decorations that we want to protect from the wind and snow. We put a lot of quilts and fabric items in large rubber tubs and I try to bag up as much of the dishes and kitchen items as I can cut down on the washing in the spring and also as protection just in case any little critters find their way into the cottage despite our best efforts at rodent proofing.

We load our boat and bring home any food or clothes or hobby materials we might want over the winter or items that might be damaged by freezing like paint.

The boat ride to the mainland dock is short but then comes the job of lifting the boat out of the lake and onto its boat trailer. Finally, it has to be winterized, drained and then wrapped up in boat covers and tarps to protect it through the winter.

This year we finished with the boat just as we witnessed a spectacular sunset. It was such a fitting finale to our cottage season.

Fall view from the Front Yard

Ours was the last boat to come out of the water at the mainland docks

The Boat Launch in Fall

Sunset Farewell

Fall on the Porch

I wanted to take these pictures because of the fantastic light that streams into the porch. I love to sit in this chair and read, have a cup of tea and just relax.

Jasper has his special place on the porch too.

The Chair Part 2

The chair we found a few weeks ago is all ours and fixed up now. We are fondly calling it our "drift wood chair" because we believe it was drifting in the water and someone fishing nearby got it out of the water and threw in on the dock to get it out of the way of the boats.

Bob worked hard at sanding down the roughest, most beat up spots but it really could not just be stained so it we were going to paint it we went all out with a vibrant blue. I love it! I keep finding myself plopping down on the chair in the backyard of the cottage. It seems that I always really wanted a comfy chair back there and never even knew it.

"Nature is by and large to be found out of doors, a location where, it cannot be argued, there are never enough comfortable chairs".
~Fran Lebowitz

The Lost Chair

We arrived at our island dock to find a chair sitting there. It is an an Adirondack chair or Muskoka Chair depending on your point of view.

We were a little worried at first.. was someone on the island? Was the cottage still secure? We wondered if the chair was left behind by someone who had been fishing off of our dock recently. Perhaps the chair has been floating around the lake for a while and someone fished it out and threw it on the dock to keep it out of the way of unsuspecting boaters.

I left it right where we found it on the dock this week. Perhaps it's owner will come back and claim it. However, just in case it isn't gone by next week, we will take out a sander, and some stain and I plan to be ready to make this old lost chair one of our own.

We will probably never know the whole story behind this beat up old chair, but maybe we will provide it with a future.