Autumn

The colors have been beautiful this year!  

A lot of factors go into the brilliance of the season- the amount of sunlight, temperature fluctuations, cloud cover, and moisture.  What happens in the fall is that as the daylight decreases, the chlorophyll (the green stuff in leaves) stops producing food.  When the chlorophyll dies off and fades away, the brilliant reds, oranges, yellows, and purples that have been present the whole time are uncovered.  Warm sunny days and cool nights help to enhance the colors that we see. Eventually the leaves detach from their branchy homes and gracefully flutter to the ground.  Enough of the botany aspect for now.

The best part of fall for kids is raking the leaves into piles and jumping in!  Our kids love playing in the leaves.  Pumpkin becomes a monster and loves to bury others under the crunchy goodness.  We have shag-bark hickory, red maple, sweet gum, ash, and a few fruit trees in our yard.  This time of the year my husband also LOVES to crack open the shag-bark hickory nuts to collect the decadent nut meat inside.  It is an extremely time consuming process and involves a hammer.  Usually you cannot make it through the season without at least one smashed finger.  Mix some of these nuts into chocolate chip cookie dough for a wonderful autumn treat! 

Fall Family Woodland Adventure

A couple weekends ago we took a hike through the forest and prairie of a local conservation area.  The kids had a lot of fun and they found a lot of leaves, seeds, and twigs.

Pumpkin seemed to be the most entranced by sycamore bark that was rolled into tubes strewed across the dry creek bed of a ford.  Princess enjoyed all of the pretty leaves.  A few nights before the hike we had a hard frost so in areas the ground was carpeted with green paw-paw leaves.

Halloweenie Fun

"The hurrier I go, the behinder I get!"

~ Lewis Carroll

I can never seem to keep caught up lately.  Anyway, here are some Halloween and family evening puzzle adventure pictures.  

We completed the Great Pumpkin puzzle over four evenings.

 

Pumpkin was the black Angry Bird for Halloween (although he switched his hat to the pig side just before the picture) and Princess was a ladybug.
 

Pumpkins, Pumpkins

Today may of been one of the last warm days of the season.  Tonight the first frost is predicted.  So we took the kids outdoors this afternoon for our annual painting pumpkins with tempera paint.  

We do not have as many pumpkins this year as in years past, so we will forgo carving a pumpkin this year.  We do have plenty of gourds on the other hand.  It was the squash of choice by the kiddos when we visited the pumpkin patch last week.  We usually opt for painting because 1) the pumpkins last longer and 2) Pumpkin wants his pumpkin to last until after his birthday in February.  He is a pumpkin fanatic!  

As you can see Pumpkin & Princess had a lot of fun decorating their pumpkins.  We did take the pumpkin inside before the predicted frost and I am sure that they will move around the house as the holiday approaches. It is never boring in our household!  (Hahaha)

Life Goes On

I meant to post sooner than now.  Famous last words of a parent!  (wink, wink)

We visited a pumpkin patch over the weekend and I have been taking some seasonal nature shots with the camera.

Things have been extremely crazy and stressful at work.  Anytime someone new comes along it is bound to happen.  Hoping that the dust settles in a few months as a new normal is established.  Although it is tempting to stay home with the kiddos, especially with all of the problems that Pumpkin has been encountering lately.

Pumpkin is still having a few rough patches at school, but on the bright side we had two good days last week and today was a good day.  So we are making a bit of progress.  Our pastor has been helping us and suggested have one to two goals to focus on each week to make progress easier to accomplish.

We took Pumpkin to our pediatrician this afternoon.  His ears are good, but it looks like he needs to have his tonsils removed.  I will have to call the ear, nose, throat specialist office tomorrow.  I imagine that if they take his tonsils out that they will either put a third set of ear tubes in or take the remaining non-functioning ear tube out of his right ear.  We also talked with our pediatrician about the reoccurring behavioral glitches that Pumpkin has been having at school and she has recommended that we see a behavioral pediatrician.  She said that it might be possible that he has some processing problems, but without testing and an official diagnosis she does not want to prescribe medicine.  So we are looking into a friend of the family that is planning to open a clinic in town soon.  If that falls through we will probably have to drive at least an hour or more to see a specialist.  She said that an out of town specialist could take up to six months to get into for a first appointment.  I am not for sure if our health insurance will cover any of this, so prayers would be appreciated.  In the mean time our pediatrician recommended that we wean Pumpkin off his allergy medicine to see if it has an affect on his behavior.
 
I have been falling behind on my intent to participate in "Making Your Home A Haven."  Week One focused on lighting a candle daily and praying for peace.  It took a while, but I did finally find a candle that does not make my allergies go haywire.  So far, I only lit it on Saturday.  I did better at remembering to pray for peace for my house, peace for my family, and peace for me.  It does have a calming affect to repetitively pray for such simple requests.   Week Two focuses on a planning a family game night and to pursue gentleness in the home (quiet voices, gentle touch, controlling anger).  We have yet to partake in a family game night this week.  Hopefully we can play some Candy Land on Thursday or Friday evening.  The kids really seem to enjoy this particular game.  Gentleness was lacking this evening with nerves frazzled, but we always have the chance to begin anew tomorrow.  I am hoping that as I work on this journey that my life with feel less stressed and more blessed.

Well, I suppose a good night sleep would help, so I better be thinking about heading that way soon.  Blessings and peace to all!