Autumn

I've been so full of doom and gloom lately (lost jobs! sick family! looming apocalypse!) that I think it's time to focus on nice stuff.

This time of year is awesome. In Nevada, autumn and spring are typically the only times when you can actually tolerate going outside for a few hours--it's not a blazing 100F day, and it's also not 20F and icy. We had a gorgeous autumn week or two (I'll take what I can get), so we hauled the poor, sick, and very helpful Toddler out to a corn maze to get some fresh air.

Don't let my sweater fool you--it was actually over 80F, and I was sweltering. But I wasn't wearing a bra, so I couldn't really take it off. Heh.

I've done the corn maze with my husband just almost every year since we started dating (six years ago!). We skipped the first one, because we were kind of on the outs at the time, and once because it rained and they weren't letting people in. It's funny looking back through all my corn maze pictures and seeing us all young and smiling, and then wham! Baby. And now Massive Toddler.

Not quite as massive in comparison to the massive hay, though.

We've since had cold weather jump on us (cold for Nevada, okay?), but I still love the way the air gets in October. There's a crisp flavor to it--snow on the mountains, the rotting leaves, the icy river. I left my office window open all day while I wrote just so I could breathe in the scent. It made my fingers too cold to type, but it was totally worth it.

I used to like autumn when I was a kid because I spent about three days excited about going back to school, until I actually got back to school and remembered how much I hated being there. But now, only the feelings of nostalgia remain. That cold smell makes me think of new clothes for school, binders, unsharpened pencils, text books...

Plus, I start baking cookies with all the good autumn flavors: nutmeg, ginger, cloves, cinnamon, a touch of allspice. You can put that in pretty much anything right now and it's a happy day. (Pancakes? YES. Pie? YES. Sandwiches? ...YES SURE WHY NOT.)

And being a week away from Halloween means candy overload, of course. I'm on a sugar embargo, but my son is not. I'm really terrible about indulging him. But how could you not, with a face like this?

I am a beautiful, attractive human being who makes beautiful, attractive faces for photos. :D

Since I started dating The Hubs in October many eons past, autumn makes me think of him a lot, too. His new status as "full-time daddy and assistant to insane writer person with insane hair" is actually really nice, money worries aside. I love having him with me again. We used to spend so much time together--we worked together, and hung out after work, and, you know, slept together. But jobs and family segregated our lives. We're united again, and reliving all those autumns we spent together in the first few years of our relationship.
 
I can't wait to take my two year old trick-or-treating again. He was pretty baffled by it last year, but I think he's going to figure out the whole "omg everyone's giving me candy" thing this year, which will make him very excited.
 
It's a good time of year. Very, very good.

I'm grateful for everything. :)

What are you guys doing to celebrate autumn?