November Days

The 1st of November is All Saints Day and might bring some fine warmer weather?

All Saints' Little Summer lasts three hours, three days or three weeks

I hope it's the latter...........please.

This months picture of a hare and a bonfire  and the words following come from the library book collected last week................

Wood-smoke and mists weave through the wind that follows the hare as she begins the last part of the journey.

 

 And she sings, 

The Hunter's Moon, The Frosty Moon

The Cold Moon, The Badgers Moon

The Long Night Moon, Novembers Moon

There's a short poem in the little book Country Poems that I picked up at a charity shop last month about Autumn bonfires, it's by Robert Louis Stevenson who wrote lots of poems for children as well as his more well know stories.

Autumn Fires

In the other gardens

And all up the vale,

From the autumn bonfires

See the smoke trail.

Pleasant summer over

And all the summer flowers,

The red fire blazes,

The grey smoke towers.

Sing a song of seasons

Something bright in all

Flowers in the summer

Fires in the Fall.

November takes its name from the Latin novem because it was the ninth month of the Roman year. The Anglo Saxons named November "Blodmonath" meaning Blood Month, maybe because this was the month when any older livestock would have been slaughtered before winter, so as to save fodder for the younger animals.

One of the weather sayings for November is quite well known

Ice in November to bear a duck,

Nothing after but slush and muck. 

From one of the childrens' books that's moved house and stayed with me for 30 years. Illustrating the Sara Coleridge poem

 From the publication date it must have belonged to Youngest daughter. The lift up flaps show the mouse family enjoying themselves each month...... I ought to see if she wants the book back for Florence.

 

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Sue