I love the warmth and smell of a wood fire – in fact, my fireplace was equipped with gas logs when I bought it, and I took them out. When cool weather approaches, and especially as the hustle and bustle of fall wears me out, I look forward to quiet evenings sitting before a crackling fire.

Fall is a great time to stock up on firewood – fewer mosquitoes and snakes, cooler temperatures for stacking and working, and it just FEELS like a fall thing to do.

We’re hard-wired to prepare for a hard winter, and gathering firewood is no exception. I like to have a nice cord of firewood at the ready, and I also like to have a few evenings’ worth stacked on my covered porch out of the rain. In addition, after my container flowers have called it quits, I use one of my large decorative planters to hold kindling right beside the door.

That little bit of sunny-day preparation allows me to spend cold, rainy evenings by the fire, where I belong, instead of outdoors gathering wood. On sunny afternoons, I even enjoy the exercise of splitting wood – it makes me feel strong and self-reliant, and it burns some of the calories of all the cocoa I’ll be drinking.