Labor Day

Labor Day is late this year and it looks like Fall might be early.

We've had a cooler than normal summer in the Dells, and that's been a good thing, for the most part. We've had few of the horrible hot, muggy days that sap the energy out of you, and lots of relatively cool, crisp sunny days.

We've had a good rain pattern, too. We didn't get the usual August dry spell that browns out the grass this year, for the first time in a long time.

The weather has encouraged the flowers, which is a bonus. We still have day lilies blooming, which is almost unheard of, and I noticed the other day that the last of the gladiolus are finally fading, several weeks after the normal schedule.

This summer has been something of a throwback to the summers I remember from the 1950's.

I'm glad for it. I planted a lot of new shrubs just in back of the house early in the summer, and they are thriving. The area in back of the house can get like a furnace, and I expected a summer's fight to keep them alive long enough to throw down a decent root system. It wasn't, as it turned out, much of a fight. The weather cooperated, and it looks like the shrubs are now established.

I realized this morning -- low 50's right now, a predicted high of 61, and dark still at 6:30 am -- that Labor Day, the traditional end of summer, is right around the corner.