Audacious Autumn

It simply beggars belief that yet another month has reached its end. Surely last time I looked we'd just turned the calendar's page to October, with Halloween and the bi-annual ordeal of changing the clocks still a whole month away. And while I'm not celebrating the former - even if there's no getting away from the spooky season merchandise - there definitely is no escaping the latter. Never mind the extra hour tagged on to the weekend, I'll still be feeling somewhat out of kilter for days. It's about time they put a stop to this nonsense.

Obviously, my blog hasn't quite made it this far yet. In fact, on Wednesday the 12th of October, we hadn't even made it halfway through the month.

We'd been blessed with another sunny day when, after a chilly low single figures start, the mercury climbed to 16°C. 

Long sleeves and layers were very much needed for that morning's commute. I even exchanged ankle boots for my knee-high mock croc ones. They are ridiculously comfy, which is why although my other knee-high boots are clamouring for attention, it is usually this pair I'm reaching for these days.

I've been busy with my seasonal changeover, doing a little bit at a time during the weekends. However, this long-sleeved frock with its blowsy pink and brown flower print is a permanent resident of my wardrobe, as I don't want to risk ruining the pleating by putting it to sleep inside one of my vacuum bags.

My blog tells me I last wore it during the first Lockdown, in April 2020, so surely it was about time I gave those pleats another twirl. I was actually wearing the exact same moss green suede belt last time, but I changed up my accessories, which were all of the green variety.

Even the lady in the vintage brooch I pinned to my briefly worn cardigan was wearing green!

No photos were taken on Thursday, which was a rainy and overcast run of the mill office day. I actually have no recollection of what I was wearing ,but it might very well have been some sort of repetition of Wednesday's outfit, or a trial run of Friday's.

The forecast for Friday the 14th of October sounded quite promising, as it was supposed to remain mainly dry. The weather gods must have been sending out the wrong signals though, as it rained from early morning until well into the afternoon. I'd taken the afternoon off, which I soon regretted as we were assaulted by lots of neighbourly building noise the minute we walked through our front door. Sigh! I guess we can't complain really, as we've had a couple of reasonably quiet weeks.

If Wednesday's dress had to wait two and a half years for its next outing, Friday's frock had to have the patience of a saint. Its last wearing dated from April 2017 and in fact I was quite certain I'd sold it on one of our local flea markets. A fact I regretted when I came across this photo, so imagine my delight when, while getting everything ready for this year's edition back in July, it turned out to be languishing at the bottom of one of my flea market boxes.

There's a smidgen of turquoise in the dress's Paisley-esque pattern which, same as five and a half years ago, prompted the addition of a turquoise belt. You can also catch a glimpse of my turquoise opaques, while I opted for blue and white for my necklace and brooch.

The temperature, which had remained a moderate 16°C all week, climbed a couple of degrees to an unseasonable 19°C on Saturday.  I'd woken up tired and with a lingering headache, which wasn't made any better by the grey sky we could spy behind our bedroom curtains and the pitter-pattering of rain on our landing skylight.

After our usual fruit & yoghurt breakfast, I washed my hair and got dressed. Then I spent a stupid amount of time looking for the snake patterned Van Dalen ankle boots I'd misplaced after finding them in a charity shop in August. At the time, I'd wrongly attributed them to Van Dal instead of Van Dalen, which is a Dutch chain of shoe shops established in 1873. I have a favourite pair of bright green suede ankle boots by them as well, and both pairs were made in Italy.

Except for the dress with its William Morris-style pattern which was an old  C&A sales bargain, the rest of my outfit was either vintage or charity shopped, including the tartan Gigue blazer and the frilly pink scarf, neither of which I needed once the sun had finally made short shrift with the blanket of grey.

We were dying for a rummage, but with the charity shops (called kringloopwinkels in Flemish, which actually translates as recycling shops) having their yearly event to promote their workings, we weren't keen on visiting any. The event usually draws quite a crowd, which the shops are taking advantage of by selling vintage and other stuff at inflated prices.

Instead, we drove down to the big Oxfam shop in the neighbouring town of Wilrijk, which is actually one of the only charity shops in the area in the true sense of the word.

Apart from two books, another King Louie dress, two cardigans and a pristine looking Oilily bag followed me home. 

I've actually been using a smaller, green bag from the same brand as my weekend bag ever since I found it back in January. This one is in a far better condition and more spacious to boot, so I wasted no time in putting it to use as my companion for our weekend escapades.

Rummaging urges satisfied, we bought a cake from a bakery we passed on our way back to the car, and drove to Jos's son and daughter-in-law for a visit and some quality time with grandson Cas.

The weather deities were on their best behaviour for once on Sunday the 16th, treating us to a sunny day with highs of 18°C. 

Aww, look at Ms. Bess basking in the rays of sunshine streaming in through the windows.

I pottered for a while in typical Sunday fashion until the eternal drilling noise started up again next door by 11 am. We'd noticed that one of our neighbour's cousins from Austria - a Johnny Depp lookalike, so that's what we are calling him - had come over again for a couple of days to help him out so, instead of finishing the wall, they were doing some heavy building work.

Desperate to escape the madness for a couple of hours, we had an early lunch, after which we set off to the park in nearby Boom for a walk.

The perfect place for a impromptu stroll, we hadn't been here in months as, due to a blockage in the sewage system in a neighbouring village at the end of July, a large amount of wastewater ended up in the brook which is running through the park. Exacerbated by the subsequent heatwave, the stench had been unbearable. Several of the resident fish hadn't survived the ordeal and even the ever-present ducks refused to take to the water. Even now, an unpleasant musty smell was still noticeable the moment we opened our car doors, so we decided to go elsewhere.

We then tried another one of our local haunts, Solhof park in Aartselaar, but couldn’t find anywhere to park our car due to roadworks. A third option, provincial domain De Schorre in Boom, had to be scrapped as well, as there was an event going on. 

At that point, we'd been driving around in circles for a while and were about to call it a day when we hit upon the idea of paying the nature reserve in Terhagen a long overdue visit.

This is where Jos grew up, smack dab in the middle of brick-making country. In fact, part of the reserve covers the place where the tiny hamlet called De Wildernis once stood. Jos was born here and it's where he lived until the row of workman's cottages was swallowed up by the clay-hungry brickworks.

Same as Walenhoek, the reserve we visited the other week, the area was reclaimed by nature after the industry fell into decline during the 1970s and 1980s. 

We have walked here countless of times over the years, most notably at the height of the pandemic when the reserve was a firm favourite as it usually wasn't quite as inundated with fellow walkers as elsewhere.

A myriad of paths criss-cross the domain, although some of them can be quite treacherous after long periods of rain, when the clay-based soil has turned into sticky mud ready to suck you in. In fact, the boots I was wearing - a slightly worn pair I'm keeping especially for nature walks - were all but ruined the last time we attempted to conquer such a path, in November 2020.

I keep forgetting whether the vintage moss green, brown and orange-red floral skirt was a Think Twice find or a charity shop one. Whatever its origins, I think there couldn't have been a more perfect colour palette for this sun-drenched Autumn day. 

The red crepe blouse trimmed with tiny white pom poms at its yoke and collar (you can see its detail in one of the collages below) did come from Think Twice, while both the black and white belt and necklace were charity shop finds.

My green cord jackets (originally from H&M) and the black and white cameo brooch I pinned to the blouse were both picked up from flea markets.

We followed our noses for a while, taking the up-and-down paths meandering through the woods, until we arrived at a grassy clearing randomly dotted with trees. The soil is quite sandy here, sometimes creating hurdles of a different kind. When we walked here on a hot day in the Summer of 2020 parts of it had turned into a subsidiary of the Sahara, with the fine sand sloshing over the tops of the Clarks Cloudsteppers I was wearing and all but burning my bare feet.

We'd only met a handful of people so far, but then the quiet was briefly interrupted by the arrival of some youths riding mountain bikes, intent on tackling the uphill path which leads to one of the most scenic parts of the reserve. Yes, you've guessed it, the very path which was our undoing in November 2020. The mountain bikes are actually part of the problem, as they are the source of the deep ruts which make the going tough even in the driest of weather.

This time, we just took the path skirting the clearing and walked back the other way, breathing in lungfuls of balmy, almost Summery air and topping up our Vitamin D levels to tide us over the dark days to come.

It had been far too long since we were last here - my blog and journal tell me it was in March 2021 - so we are planning to return for a longer walk soon. Who knows, perhaps it will stay dry for long enough so that we can finally make it to the top of that path again.