Summers End

A surprise meet my eyes as I was holding little E to look out the window the other day. There was a beautifully puffed up bird sunbathing in my pedestal bird bath. The bath has been there for a year and this is the first actual bird bathing sighting I've had. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I finally cleaned out the bird feeders and refilled them with fresh seed - we've see our bird population grow again. Well it brought satisfaction to my soul to see something so sweet.

We've got a thick carpet of leaves covering our yard - it's beckoning to be crunched in. I think we'll have to haul out the rakes after nap time today and start some piles. H will inevitably want to make "airplane piles" to sit in and fly to Idaho to visit the cousins. Something he remembers us doing last year and apparently loved!

The garden is calling to me to be put to sleep for the season. I'm holding out, hope that those few remaining tomatoes will ripen before the frost comes. I can always haul them inside to ripen, but on the vine means one less thing on my kitchen counters.

Oh . . . apples! A dear friend from WI delivered 30 pounds of apples to me yesterday. Soon we'll be in the midst of apple pies, crisps, sauces and dried slices for snacking on. Mmmm . . . anyone have any good sauce recipes?



Yesterday we enjoyed what could be our final picnic of the year. We went to visit the college campus I used to work at and sat by the lake for a leisurely lunch. The battery on my watch has died. I lOVE schedules but I have to admit that it's nice not to always have my watch around to keep us on track. We stayed at our picnic much longer than planned but it felt so nice to have the boys toppling over themselves on the blanket, little E tasting a few leaves, H's face and hands deliciously covered in chocolate from the cookies we baked this last weekend and wriggling our feet in the grass.

A few quotes from H to top off this very long post:
- "I'm cleaning it for the next baby, and the next one, and the next one . . ." as he's swiping a nuk back and forth across his jeans.
- "I want a girl next time." Yep he's referring to a baby sister. By the way, his papa and I have no announcements to make at this time, nor are we expecting to make any in the near future.
- "Boopers" I have been informed is what you call pancakes in Spanish

That's ALL for now folks. Happy leaf crunching!