Well, as I type this, it's snowing. We got only a dusting for now, and we're in an eye of a storm, but looks to be another wave coming through. We're not going to get any real accumulation from this, and I'm not complaining as it's free moisture, but I had a lot of beautiful buds ready to open and they're now all toast. I took pictures last night of my unfulfilled promises.

Apricot mini, NoID


Blue Bayou


Circus


Distant Drums


Hawkeye Belle (I love this rose)


Koko Loko


Kordes Perfecta (this one didn't blossom much this year, and then I get 1 perfect bud...)


Lagerfeld (this poor rose has been moved like 4 times in 3 years...)


Macho Man (from Cliff back in August.. and it's trying to bloom poor thing)


Magenta (pretty rose from Palatine)


Mister Lincoln (again, another rose that didn't bloom at all year and NOW it puts out a bud.. go figure)


Mardi Gras (this will keep blooming until an extremely hard frost)


Oranges & Lemons (only got a fall flush, no spring flush)


Orchid Masterpiece (love this rose... glad I got 2 of 'em!)


Remember Me (beautiful rose.. I really like it, it's really different from anything else I have)


Scentimental


Summer Sunshine (this is an AWESOME rose.. soooo hardy.. this was one of the first roses I put in the back yard & it's survived and bloomed through EVERYTHING)


Sunny Delite


Sunsprite


And a couple of roses that had opened

Outta the Blue


And Cha-ching! This one had done something really weird as far as a spent rose... any clue?

Oh no! Too early for the white stuff So many pretty blooms there. What a shame to have them all ruined.

Oh look, a vegetative center on a rose. I usually see those more on the OGRs.
The one lower down in the picture is an even better example.

I have no idea on what it is.. I've never seen anything like it before. What's a vegetative center? The rose does have standard hips, too.

It's a leafy growth in the center, not caused by disease or bugs. It won't spread to your other roses. Some roses are more prone to it than others. Backing off on the fertilizer helps reduce it in some cases. I had the worst case of it when I put a lot of horse manure under the large once blooming OGRS.

Thanks for the rose parade Toni. It gives me hope for next year. Maybe I'll be able to win the battle with deer by then. I have one blossom from Rainbow Sorbet. And one from Rise 'n' Shine. But nothing photogenic.

I'm holding my breath about the weather, too. Frost cut my dahlias to the ground last night, but within the last week or so most of the roses have been making new leaves like it will never go out of style. For the foreseeable future - i.e. the next ten nights - there will be no frost, and the daily highs will be around 76F. So the roses here will be happy. But I realize I need to start spraying them with rose antifreeze this week.

And the ski season has officially started on Saturday

http://www.denverpost.com/brea...

The ski season in Colorado officially began Saturday.

It was announced not with the din of snow-making machines pasting a path of man-made snow between dirt and rocks, but the distant whoops of avalanche-control bombs. And accompanied by heaps of powder.

Saturday, 1,500 skiers and snowboarders from across the region converged on remote Wolf Creek Ski Area, four hours from Colorado Springs, for the most memorable ski season opening in recent memory.

Every year, the Interstate 70-corridor ski areas Loveland and Arapahoe Basin​ compete to make enough snow for an 18-inch base on one or two ski runs to open first. But as both were firing up snow guns for the first time Thursday, an autumn storm was dumping 3 feet of snow on Wolf Creek, in the San Juan Mountains​ of southern Colorado.

Get more on this story, including a photo gallery, at Gazette.com.

It's almost as if we live in a different world! Here it is in the 80s with no sign of summer ever ending.

It's been in the80's here also but that is about to end we have cold rain in the forcast but this is Michigan we shall see

And another ski area is opening tomorrow (Thurs 10/13)

http://www.denverpost.com/brea...

Arapahoe Basin is opening Thurs., Oct. 13, the ski area posted on its website.

The Black Mountain Express will open at 9:00 a.m.

A-Basin says there is an 18-inch base on the intermediate High Noon run along with several features in the High Divide Terrain Park.

A tribute to Arapahoe Basin founders Marnie Jump and Max Dercum, who passed away this year, will take place before the lifts open.

Opening day adult lift tickets are $59, youth tickets are $49 and children are $30.

For more informatio go to ArapahoeBasin.com.