The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

I might be pushing the seasons along, but this morning when I stepped into the garden I could smell fall in the air. I glanced down at the pumpkin plants, tendrils winding among the lavender and noticed several squash flow- ers opened in bright shades of yellow.

Pumpkin flowers are a sure sign you'll have squash in fall, truly my favorite winter vegetable in soup, stew, casserole, chutney and pie.

Later in the day, I drove out along Mill Creek Road to a friend's potato farm and helped dig-up the last of this year's yellow fin potato harvest. After two hours waddling in the dirt, the job was...