The Thursday Night Live season is over and temperatures are getting cooler, but there still are opportunities to socialize with other Washington residents and get locally-sourced produce and goods.

Washington Farmers’ Market Master Bob Shepherd says some produce crops were slow to come out this summer such as tomatoes, “The unusual thing is that crops were late coming on but some were earlier. We’ve had pumpkins for a couple weeks now and we’ve never had pumpkins in August before that I’m aware of, the winter squash are there and they look fantastic. My personal favorite is the butternut and it’s really looking good, so there’s a lot of good squash and they’re good keepers. Butternuts will keep until April if you keep them in a cool, dry place.”

Shepherd also recommends purchasing baked goods now and freezing them until the holiday season arrives, and there are still a variety of craft and food vendors at the weekly farmers’ market. Shepherd explains the value of farmers market produce, “The best thing about the produce you get from the growers here is it probably was still in the ground or still on the vine that day. So it’s super fresh and it’s picked ripe they don’t have to pick ahead and worry about transport. So they can let it ripe, like the tomatoes are ripened on the vine so they’re vine-ripened tomatoes, and they just have an extra pop as far as flavor.”

The Washington Farmers’ Market takes place from 5-7:30 p.m. Thursdays through October 18th at central park.