Learn how to decorate for fall using common ranch-house items.
It’s officially fall, which means pumpkin spice and everything nice — if you live in town. Cinnamon-scented candles, fireplace scenes on the TV, “Harvest Time” signs and mason jars filled with something auburn colored suddenly appeared overnight in every suburban neighborhood across the country.
For ranchers, fall means dried leaves are now tracked into the house along with the standard dirt clods and dried manure. We harvest calf crops in the fall, and we drink milk out of mason jars year-round. We definitely pass if the milk is auburn-colored, though.
So, how can ranchers and cowboy-type people decorate for the new season? Here are a few tips from a ranch wife wholly unqualified to arrange pillows on a couch, much less advise others on how to decorate an entire home.
Cowboy boots
These are mainstream fashion’s go-to footwear choice for fall. Like many of you, my family wears cowboy boots every month of the year. They also serve double duty as rustic, stylish home décor, especially when clean and lined up neatly beneath a bespoke coat rack monogrammed with each family member’s first initial.
Or so I would imagine, anyway. We live in a real home on a real ranch, so our boots are only clean five minutes before church. I kind of feel like a bespoke coat rack might be a doable option, though. All I need to do is dig through the scrap wood pile, grab a few used horseshoes, fire up the forge, put on my work gloves, and get my husband to build it. The gloves are to keep my fingers warm in the chilly autumn air while I tell him what he’s doing wrong.
Fly strips
October brings one last hurrah for flies on the ranch. They don’t settle down peacefully for their long winter slumber; instead, they attack crumbs on the counter and dinner plates with gusto not previously seen during the summer months. They’re like grizzly bears fattening up for winter, except much less likely to maul your face if you surprise them in the wild.
Don’t be afraid to hang one fly strip in every room and two in the kitchen during these warm days of autumn. Just remember — that won’t do anything to help your grizzly problem, though. My sympathies to every rancher in Wyoming, parts of Montana, and all of Canada.
Wood chips
Ah, there’s nothing like a crackling fire in the ol’ wood stove on a cold night. It keeps the house warm and provides company of sorts as darkness falls. Wood heat also provides an ample supply of wood chips, splinters, and pieces of bark scattered evenly throughout the house. Don’t worry if you don’t see them right away; you’ll find them with your feet as you walk barefoot to the bathroom in the middle of the night.
The highest concentration will be found directly in front of the stove or fireplace, but I’ve also found kindling pieces in my kids’ laundry hamper. This may reveal more about their room-cleaning abilities than any drawbacks we experience from using a wood stove.
Little piles of alfalfa flakes
Sprinkle these onto any available surface, including but not limited to the floor, recliner, bedspread, bookshelf and kitchen table. They can also be found on the shoulders of every barn coat and the brim of every cowboy hat. It’s like confetti for livestock owners. Sometimes I think my husband feeds hay with a leaf blower. I wonder if the horses and cattle even get a bite, or if I vacuum up their entire dinner every time I clean the house.
Gloves everywhere…
…except on your hands when it’s cold. That’s probably because my kids have separated and distributed every pair of gloves ever brought into this house, and we can never find a pair in the same size, much less ones that match in style and color, when the temperature drops.
I might have to delay my coat rack building project until I can get a new pair of gloves. My husband will be so disappointed.
