starting fall prep for spring

Dear Friend,
     The weather is getting cooler and soon old man winter will be beating down my door.  I have no much to do to prepare for the winter and next spring.  I started this past weekend with removing the dead flowers from my marigolds.  I make sure that I get as many as I can for the spring.  I put them in a glass jar so that I can have lots of flowers for next year. 
     Once I get the spent blooms off the plants I pull the spent marigold plants and put them in the compost pile. I then go around and dump out any pots that have left over dirt.  I never throw away putting soil, instead I put it in the compost pile to reuse next year in one of my outside pots.  I make sure to re-use anything useful in the garden.
   I also made DH cut back all my flower beds and topped them off with grass clippings to prepare the soil for next spring. Before I cover the beds with the grass I put down at least 4 layers of newspaper to kill any weeds that are still in my flower beds.  I know it's a lot of work to do for what seems like nothing but I hope I'll get a leg up on my spring planting....
    So till later   ...............MB