Autumn...just the intro to winter

Yep, it's that time of year again. Boy, summer sure does seem to get shorter and shorter every year. The leaves change color quicker, the cool weather arrives faster, birds are gone, flowers are mostly done blooming, farmers are out taking the crops off. Combines go up and down the road all day long it seems.
I've trying to get out every day and get some winter prep work done. I have potted up Elephant Ears, a geranium, spider plants, impatiens, and various other things. I pulled up a lot of geraniums and put them into a paper bag to store away until next year. I've cut the Castor Bean plants down, they were already blown over from the wind. Also cut down the Perilla, pulled the 4 O'Clocks out and am ready to start digging up the Canna's next.
I have a list, and I have checked it twice, three times, for things to be done before frost. I've collected seeds and sorted those out. Some I will keep for winter sowing (another post on another day soon), some I will give away and some I have all set for a seed exchange.
Leaves are falling in swarms now. Some trees are bare already and some are close behind. Raking and blowing them into piles to make mulch will be coming real soon. Walnuts are dropping like crazy too. Here is a picture of what we've collected so far, and I bet there is already that many more below the trees again and we've probably pitched just as many into the woods.
Speaking of trees, there is another thing to add to the list. We have loads of trees, some large and some small. There is a section behind the barn that has many smaller trees, 8 foot tall or less. There is Walnut, Maple, Elm, and Poplar. I need to go out and mark those as to what they are before the leaves fall off. We are going to transplant many of those to other locations on the property once they go dormant. Most of them are too close together and we really want to give the Walnut trees enough space to grow freely. Not that we don't have enough of them, but they won't last forever, so we are going to keep them planted at intervals so that maybe they could last for many generations to come.
Have you ever heard the old wives tale that the first frost occurs 90 days after you hear the first cicada begin its singing? I only heard that this year, in June, from one of the local news stations. We heard our first cicada July 4, which would make our first frost October 4th. Well, luckily, no frost yet, so that tale is ruined. Frost won't be far away though, you can feel the crisp coolness on the wind. It will be here soon, bringing SNOW shortly after.