Frost report

On Monday we had the first frost of the season. Living in a valley, we have our own little frost pocket. We're always a couple of degrees cooler than the village, a mile and a half away. This morning we had a hard frost, as did most of the locality.

The kids greeted the frost as if it were the first snow of the season and bolted out of the house as soon as they were dressed. To be fair, snow is now so rare here that they consider a good hoar frost a reasonable alternative.

Of course, the other advantage of this type of weather is the fantastically sunny days. Crystal clear blue skies during the day and occasionally, those watery evening skies and pink sunsets - we've had a few of them in the last few weeks.

The frost has brought on a major leaf drop. Driving from home this morning, the local roads were dusted with golden Beech and Field Maple leaves. This weather is truly exceptional when you consider how autumn can be. If this winter is going to be very cold (as they say it might), I won't mind if we can have more days like these.