Pumpkins and Hay Mazes

Fall. It's my favorite. And one of the reasons is what the season is named after...the falling of the leaves. I love the colors, I love when they tumble to the ground, I love the crunch they make when you step on them.

A few days ago I had just sent the kids out the door to school and things were quiet. As I sat at my computer I heard some geese honking. Heading south for the winter. It got louder and louder and seemed never ending. "Good heavens," I thought to myself..."How many geese are there?" So I got up, opened the front door and stepped out onto the front porch. Tons of them was my answer. Over head, tons of them flying in V formation. Coming in waves. And they were loud! But in a really delightful sort of way. The wind was blowing in a storm so the leaves were raining from the trees and blowing down the street in that crackly sort of way they do when they are dry and crunchy. It was the perfect little slice of Fall goodness.

Over Fall Break Heather and I took the kids to a nearby hay maze. I didn't expect it to be as impressive as it was seeing as it was just a little local place. It's always nice when expectations are exceeded, yes? The hay maze was huge. We got ourselves good and lost in there for a long time. But being lost had a purpose in this maze. Beyond just wandering, we were searching for 10 different hole punches that matched the shapes on the little cards we were given as we first entered. A treat was promised at the end if we found them all. We climbed up and over big hay bridges, crawled through low to the ground, claustrophobia-inducing tunnels. (Thank you iPhone flashlight app!) And basically stayed lost for a good while....long enough to find all 10 hole punches and earn ourselves a prize. Also long enough to get hay down my pants and to keep me itching the rest of the evening.

And in other Fall related news....

Token picture of Lilian at the pumpkin patch trying to find the perfect pumpkins to reign over our front porch Fall/Halloween display...and then to turn into a jack-o-lantern the week of.

I volunteered to help Lilian's 1st grade class do "pumpkin math." We measured the pumpkin...its height and its girth. We weighed it and counted its grooves. We described what it felt like on the outside....and on the inside. We guesstimated how many seeds there would be, and then actually counted them by tens. (559 seeds, thank you very much.) And then we carved the sucker. First graders are enthusiastically cute.