Fall fun

Fall is my favorite time of year. It has taken a while to cool all the way off to acceptable fall temperatures this year, but this week it finally happened. I love long golden fall afternoons--the sun really is more golden right now than it is the rest of the year. Maybe it's all in my head, maybe there's an astronomy-based explanation, or maybe it's just a GIFT after a long blazing summer. Whatever the reason, I'll take that golden autumn sunshine and enjoy it. Fall in the Yakima Valley is nothing compared to fall in the Shenandoah Valley, but I can still find comfort and joy in my leafy garland, bright orange pumpkins, hearty chili, fresh bread, and all things pumpkin and apple. 

The kids tried out their Halloween costumes multiple times this week. Jay is an army guy, Rose is a beautiful butterfly, and Amber is a strawberry. 

Strawberries make me drool too. I couldn't believe she stopped trying to rip that hood off long enough for me to take a few pictures.

 The stuffed bum of this fleece strawberry suit cracks me up! She's like a little Oompa Loompa.

Amber's sad little baby lip protruding underneath the happy berry face hood is too much.

There's something about kids in the fall. A few years ago I hung these photo series of little Jay and baby Rose in the fall, and I have been rather excited to take pictures of Amber in the fall colors to add to this collection. [someday I'll even get frames for them]

We went to the pumpkin patch at Bill's Berry Farm yesterday after school, and I relished the bright sunlit pumpkins and the general fall ambiance of the pumpkin patch. I put my little camera to good use, and my family was very patient. I just love pumpkin pictures! So I took a lot. The pictures turned out as good as could be expected from a regular mom with a regular pocket camera on the auto setting. I love them all. 

The sun came out and made the kids squint, but it also lit up the pumpkins.

The sweetest pumpkin in the whole patch wasn't even orange.

Is she really going to be ONE year old in 2.5 weeks?

That golden autumn sunshine just melted all over the orange pumpkins.

It was exceedingly difficult to get a smile out of Amber. She was too busy exploring all the new textures and keeping the sun out of her eyes to care much about the silly voices or games of peek-a-boo to we employed to get her to smile.

Rose was willing to smile. Can you believe all those pumpkins? It wasn't a real pumpkin patch--they placed pre-picked pumpkins in a big field. There were so many pumpkins though, it must've taken them forever to scatter them all around! 

Pumpkin-climbing didn't end well.

I couldn't get enough of the sunny pumpkins. The were practically glowing.

We took one family pumpkin picture, with the camera propped up on the baby basket. 4/5 of us are actually looking and smiling! Maybe we should stop while we're ahead and call this our yearly family photo. 

After the pumpkin photo-thon, we took the hay ride over to get some fresh warm pumpkin donuts. Amber liked them just as much as the rest of us. 

Happy October.