20 Times

When Claire and I got home from dropping off the kids at school this morning, we were still in our pajamas. We wrapped ourselves in blankets on the couch to read for a while. Claire picked up the first book she wanted to read and said that she love-love-love-love-love-love-loves it. (She said “love” so many times.) 

And then, I guess to summarize, she said:

“I love it 20 times.”

Which brings me to this: October is back again. 

There are leaves on the streets and the smell of autumn is here: crisp and changing, brown and earthy.

The tops of the tomatoes are dead with frost and it’s time to pull everything out. 

The mornings and evenings are crisp, sometimes downright cold. 

I’m looking forward to making a batch of apple butter on the stove, filling my house with the scent of cinnamon and cloves. 

I bought spring bulbs to put in the ground so we can enjoy a bunch of beautiful happiness in six months when tulips carpet my small flower bed in front.

We’ve started burning fires, and there’s a sparkly spider and little witch hat on the mantle to show some October spirit. 

That’s all fine and good, and I love it all. 

But when I’m outside these days, I can’t stop staring. You’d think I have never seen golden trees before. But they are my absolute favorite. 

And every time and every day, I am—figuratively, and often literally—stopped in my tracks. Over and over...and over.

It was cool on Saturday when I woke up, and a bit breezy outside. I put my shoes on and went running. I saw sunlight filtering through a tree close to my house that never can decide, every year, if her leaves should be yellow or red. So she is both, and beautiful. And when the morning sun catches her, she is something to behold. 

Seeing her lit my heart right up. 

Life! Joy! Light!

And I know that this autumn will be over in just a minute.

But here’s the thing:

I love it 20 times.

Fall Trees

Who doesn't love the leaves changing in the fall?

I've been watching this tree with pure joy the past couple of weeks.

It's gone from this:

to this,

 and now this, just this afternoon -- colors faded, a few lingering leaves left to fall.

Beautiful.

On Monday, we created mosaic trees of our own.

It seems mighty hard to imagine that Thanksgiving is just two weeks away.  We're getting in our fall love before it's time to switch gears.

Pumpkin Picking and Invitation Making

On Saturday night, we went to pick our pumpkins.
We came home and ate Tillamook's Udderly Chocolate ice cream -- some chose it with rootbeer on top for a float, others of us drizzled ours with chocolate and caramel sauce.

Yesterday after church I had apple butter cooking on the stove all day.
We made invitations for our family trick-or-treat party on Halloween.
It was really fun.Foam stickers.
Markers.
Putting them in envelopes.
Today we're biking down to the post office to mail them.

And I just have to highlight one of my all-time loves of fall that I thought about again on our afternoon walk yesterday post invitation-making.
This.
I glory in these always.
Bright, brilliant, blazing yellow.
A wish of mine?
One day, if we ever own a chunk of property, I'd plant a whole line of them all down the property line just so that I could see this glorious light, every year, for a few weeks.

Two Thoughts Tonight

I love the deliciously large elm tree in our backyard.

Except.
Except.
Except.

For today.

Whoa.

For the last several days it has started dropping its lovely white seeds.

But today it's done over achieved. (And now I'm turning hickish.)

I've almost got a honest-to-goodness blanket of snow on my lawn out there. And in my flowerbeds. And in my flower pots. All over the deck and the garden. All over my front porch.

We are not on very good terms right now, that tree and I.

It is a freakishly-clean-person's nightmare. Mine. (Sometimes I think I'm a bit freakish.)

I hope it all blows away soon so I don't feel stressed about vacuuming my carpets and sweeping entryways to try to keep those blasted half-inch circles from blizzarding our house as well.

And the other thing.

At this stage in my mothering, you know what I do every single day?

Clean a spill.

Every. single. day.

You name it.

Some color.
Some liquid.
Some inconvenience.
Some THING every day.

This thought registered this morning when Isaiah spilled milk from his cereal. On the table, on the floor, and on his clean shorts as well -- which we had just barely put on. And tonight, when he also spilled apple juice from his cup. All over the table, the floor, and his sister too. And I found myself thinking about how I had just barely cleaned the floor. On my hands and knees. With a wet rag.

(And I seem to be very fond of the period punctuation mark in this post, by the way.)

Every. single. day.

But I'd rather be home, able to clean that and read stories and take walks and have hair-brained days and be with these children I love more than life itself than be anywhere or doing anything else.

Every. single. day.