Life > Columnists > Annie Calovich

Posted on Sat, Oct. 24, 2009

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Autumn is bursting with color this year

BY ANNIE CALOVICH

The Wichita Eagle

I was thrilled to get lost in Reflection Ridge this week, coursing around Tee Time, down Meadow Pass and doubling back to Reflection Road, all the while taking in the views at every bend.

The past week has been spectacular for fall color, and the various hues are stacked one on top of the other in the west-side neighborhood — fire-engine-red burning bushes on orange sugar maples on golden Chinese pistaches on purple ornamental pears. I could’ve stayed lost all day.

The weather has been ideal for prolonging this feast for the eyes. Think back to falls past when the summers were dry and the leaves fell crisp and dusty. Contrast that to this year, when the trees and shrubs and lawns and flowers have enjoyed a cool and damp summer and a fall of moderate temperatures that haven’t frozen the plants on one hand or fried them on the other.

I did eventually find my way to my destination in Reflection Ridge — the home of Bob and Suzette Moore, decorated for autumn, Halloween and even Thanksgiving already, inside and out.

The front porch of the Moores’ brick house has been turned into a mini pumpkin patch, stacked with hay bales and baskets of mums and tumbling with pumpkins and gourds of all shapes, sizes and colors — green, blue, pink, red and, of course, orange.

Two Chinese pistache trees in golden finery frame the view from the street.

Suzette plays the witch every year around Halloween at Maize School, where she dresses up and reads to second-graders. I have to say her appearance at her red front door matched the role (of a good witch of course) — purple dress and black stockings and animal-print heels, red streaks in her hair. Two cats prowled underfoot.

As soon as the breezes start blowing cold from the north in the fall, Suzette gets the itch to redecorate, and she gets the help of professionals who have become friends.

One is Rosie Reyna, floral manager at the Dillons at 13th and Tyler. Rosie let her imagination run large to create the pumpkin patch.

“I think big because she’s got a huge porch,” Rosie said.

Another talented friend is Carol Jones, a faux painter. Suzette and Carol pal around during the day, prowling Wichita stores and estate sales for inspiration. Jones then helps Moore decorate with whatever they find.

“We have boatloads of stuff,” Suzette said.

“We just add every year — add, add, add,” Carol added.

“I like everything,” Suzette said. “Carol helps me edit. She’s the one with the good eye and the one who can really take anything and make it work.”

The two have already decorated Suzette’s dining room table for Thanksgiving.

“The buildup is so much more exciting” when the whole family can anticipate the holiday, Carol said. Plus it gives a busy mom a way to ramp up for the work ahead. “It’s another case where you can extend the celebration by getting ready early.”

This year, Suzette’s table has come alive with a swag of dense velvety seedheads laid down the center of the table atop layers of tablecloths in rich earth tones. Setting off a spark at each place setting is clear red glassware hand-blown in Venice. (The pattern, Carol says, was taken from glasses featured in the 1955 Katharine Hepburn film “Summertime.” Wrong season, maybe, but the jewel tones work for autumn.)

“These are Target, and those are Christian Dior,” Suzette said, noting leaf-shaped plates that have been placed atop fine china. “It’s like the two of us — we’re a mixed bag.”

it’s filled with bare branches and pheasant feathers, pheasant-feather-wrapped globes, and gold and bronze spangles. Real pecans and walnuts in their shells are scattered about both au naturel and spray-painted gold.

“My philosophy is you find good people and you love them,” Suzette said. “I make them all my friends and family, then they love you, and good work happens.”

As I left Suzette and Carol I snapped photos of hostas in the front yard that have turned golden to match the season. Have I just been asleep every other fall, or are hostas more alive this year, too?

“I think it’s just a good year for color,” master gardener and hosta lover Janie Chisholm told me. Hostas always turn yellow as they go dormant, she said, “but I think they are just so brilliant this year. It’s just beautiful. It’s just gorgeous. I think it’s the temperatures we’re having and the shorter days and it’s just the right combination for them to be pretty.”

Janie also said the colors changed overnight.

“I was just on my deck, and Thunderbolt (hosta) just overnight has these big edges of gold color. And my Japanese maple by the pond is just brilliant, just gorgeous. It’s like it just turned overnight.”

I wish we could hold onto it forever. But when I got back into my car and pulled away from Suzette’s house, I was disappointed to find my way out of Reflection Ridge and onto 21st Street all too easily.

Reach Annie Calovich at 316-268-6596 or acalovich@wichitaeagle.com.