There is a lot of action in the compost pile these days! Ours is a generous size—a railroad tie in length on each side and a couple of ties high. All year, I make pots over pumpkins. I love their irregular curvy ridges and overall great forms. Eventually those pumpkins give way, however, so I make clay molds of the ones with the shapes and sizes I like best. Then I can still make pumpkin pots when pumpkins are not available. The succumbing real pumpkin disappears into the compost until late spring when its seeds germinate to remind me of its heroic past in my studio. By July I have the biggest tangle of vines you’ve ever seen, with magnificent leaves of myriad shapes and sizes not only from pumpkins but other seedy sources too. Then we dig all the new compost into one side of the pile and let the verdant vines cascade over the other sides of the compost square and into the yard. I cut the largest leaves off to use to shape platters and plates. Their veining is wonderful, their shape pure summer-- talk about organic! Who says pumpkins are only about autumn?
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