The autumn months are such an easy time to decorate the garden, a front porch, or inside the home with items found in most gardens and nurseries.

In October, start with a few mums transplanted from the garden into pots, pails, baskets, tubs, etc. (they can be planted back into the garden wen no longer needed for decorations) and massed together form a beautiful decoration. No mums in the garden?  Nurseries often have a large variety in early October from which to select. A variety of colors make the best display.

Add pumpkins and/or gourds to the display raised on old garden chairs, overturned 5-gallon pots, a couple of pieces of wood, or just leave on the ground for added visual interest.

A few large leaves that have fallen and not yet been added to the compost pile will add to the decoration.

All of that works for both indoor and outdoor displays. However, the pumpkins will probably not last through December in the warmer indoor air.

Round out the display in October with a skeleton, bats, or a witch to celebrate Halloween. Trade those items for a scarecrow in November.

Scarecrows are easy to assemble. Supplies needed: rope, 2 vine support stakes about6 feet each, an old shirt, and old pair of pants, an old floppy hat, and straw which can be found in feed supply stores. Start by tying the support sticks together to form a lower case “t”. Cut a hole in the pants at the bottom of the zipper and slide the pants onto the long support stick. Unbutton the shirt and slide the arms over the cross stick. Button the shirt, tuck it into the pants, and tie the bottoms of each pant leg closed with rope. Stuff the pants with straw first then the top and sleeves of the shirt. Secure the scarecrow into the ground or prop it up (or tie it) securely by a fence and plop the hat at the top of the shirt. The terrific news about this scarecrow is that nothing is wasted. The shirt, pants, and hat an be saved for another year, the stakes can be used in the garden come spring, and the straw can be used as mulch in the garden.

Once Thanksgiving has passed, changing the outside display is a simple matter of removing the scarecrow and mums and getting some spray paint, a little glitter if that sort of thing is appealing, solar twinkling lights, and evergreen leaves or a few branches from bushes that bear red berries (like pyracantha). Spray the pumpkins silver, gold, red, or green. If making the pumpkins into red or green “ornaments” for the display, also punch a bread tie through the bottom of a small paper cup to form a “hoop” and spray the cups silver to glue over the stem as the top of the ornament. Once the pumpkins dry, set them out with twinkling lights and foliage placed around them to highlight the display. Once the display is dismantled, the foliage can be added to a compost pile and the twinkling lights can be strung through citrus trees to keep them protected from freezing weather.