My calendar seems to flip through days, weeks and months about as fast as my car's odometer flips through miles on a hurried trip. It's October already. Where did the spring and summer go?

The good news is that our fall weather has been ideal and you still have time to plant. I hope so because I am just about halfway through part three of a four part landscaping project surrounding the cobblestone walks I completed last fall. Projects five through eight have already been filed in that huge box in my mind labeled, "wait till next year."

As we plant into approaching colder weather there are a few tips to follow. First you need to make sure that plants enter the cold season with adequate moisture. This season with its adequate rainfall should present no problems. I am watering as I plant and once a week until we have had an inch of natural rainfall. I then go away.

Second and more importantly, the key to prevent winter heaving is to plant, wait until the soil freezes, and then mulch to keep the soil temperatures more stable. Winter heaving is the process where newly established plants are raised, even expelled, from the ground by the repeated freezing and thawing of the soil. If you spot plants that are coming out of the ground during the winter, a well-placed large boot is an appropriate solution.

Turning to the vegetable garden one might think of a fall cover crop to add organic matter to the soil. We have been gathering the yard clippings and piling them on the garden. I am debating whether to roto-til the garden this fall or wait for spring. Remember that anytime you add green organic material to a garden you give up some nitrogen to the decomposition process, thus a little extra nitrogen is advisable as long as you remember that most vegetable crops are not heavy users of fertilizer.

I am also eying my grass clippings for an experiment. I am tempted to try to follow the lead of a friend who claims great success with growing potatoes on the soil surface. He lays the seed potatoes on the ground's surface, covers them with organic material and waits for a normal harvest. He uses hay. No digging, just pulling the hay away at harvest time.

Also, if you have dying or decaying plants in the vegetable garden it is wise to either remove them or incorporate them into the soil now. I had some disasters this season, which I blame on the cooler, wetter spring and my unwillingness to spray as needed. My tomatoes were the worst in years. Leaving diseased litter in the garden is an invitation for disease and insect problems next year.

Also think about any weeds still out there. Hopefully, it is not too late to grab them before they scatter their seed. The only way to get rid of weed problems is not to have any weeds. If you think about that last sentence long enough it might make sense. If it doesn't, just go pull a few weeds and it won't matter.

If you are desperate for some fall color you could add a few pansies, ornamental cabbages or garden mums. The pansies will generally survive the winter and give you a head start in the spring. The ornamental cabbage will last at least until Christmas and longer without severe cold. The mums are great color but please notice I omitted the word hardy. You will get some winter survival but will usually be disappointed if you plant them thinking that they are perennials.

The time is also coming to start thinking about those annual bulbs and tubers in the gardens. Primarily I am thinking about gladiolas, cannas and large flowered dahlias. There are others. You either leave them in the ground and start over next spring or dig and store them. We'll talk about that next week.

Once this is off to the editor I'm going to get a few stepping stones for my projects. After last night's rain it will be a day or so before I can resume planting, but I can still find something to do because the season is fleeting away and I'm not ready to think about next year yet.