Celebrating Fall

You can call it celebrating Halloween if you'd like--I'm not offended. But I don't consider October 31 to be the huge holiday that it seems to have become. To me, Halloween is just merely one day in my family's celebration of fall.

This celebration starts in early September and goes through Thanksgiving when my mind turns to celebrating Christmas. Pulling out a stack of fall-themed children's books is the first hint that I've had enough with the heat of summer. Then comes decorating the house as I long for the beauty of fall days spent outdoors.

With the first hints of cooler weather, Wyatt's mini Christmas tree sheds its summer sunflower garland and adorns itself with mottled red, orange, and yellow leaves, dried mini corn with the husks still attached, and a plush turkey that rests precariously on top. On the end tables, toddler-sized plush Pilgrims and Indians surround an overflowing cornucopia for little hands to sneakily touch when mommy isn't looking.

Then come the vases full of little-boy-picked yellow daisies that grow wild at the edge of our hay fields. And the tulip-poplar leaf piles that make the perfect crunching sound for jumping in (and that my poor husband has finally learned to mow around).
With Wyatt growing up, this year, we added some new aspects to our celebration of the season: Pumpkin decorating at the library.
Visiting a pumpkin patch with some friends from church.And attending our church's Fall Festival (yes, that's my little daredevil atop the huge inflatable slide).
As we celebrate the transition from summer to fall and from fall to winter, I am reminded that God alone effects all these changes in the world around me--breathtaking, beautiful changes to prepare the earth for the blossoms of spring to come:

"He changes times and seasons; he sets up kings and deposes them. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning" (Daniel 2:21).