September's in the Air...

It's hard to believe, but September's already half over. The kids and I have slowly settled back into our school routine. We wake up while it's still dark outside, and on cold mornings I make a fire.

Fall is coming... the leaves are turning colors. The mosquitoes have more or less vanished (weren't they terrible this year??). And there's a definite chill in the air. We haven't had a frost yet, so I am still picking small amounts of green beans, tomatoes, and peppers from the garden. Most of the squash we've left unpicked, waiting for that first frost to infuse them with their full sweetness.

Last weekend Jon and the kids filled the greenhouse up with firewood. I was glad for the help, because Sunday night Jon left for a month-long job in Colorado. 

As before when he worked in Colorado, he's not in the scenic, mountainous part of the state. He's in the northeast corner, which is more or less desert. It's flat, windy land with scrub areas that sometimes conceal rattlesnakes and scorpions.



The kids and I will miss having Jon home on weekends, but school and seasonal activities will hopefully keep us busy. We'll probably go to an orchard this weekend and pick apples; the one near our house has a corn maze and Spooky Trail they like to visit in the fall. Then the weekend after that they'll be staying at their Aunt Sally's while I go to my cousin Josh's wedding in Wausau.

On September 11th we went to a parade in Colfax. It was a nice, sunny day and the kids had a lot of fun watching the marching bands go by (and picking up candy thrown to kids along the street).

Marching bands from Colfax and Elk Mound did a nice job; Leila was very impressed with the "princesses" who carried flags and waved at everyone from floats.

Someone handed out flags and Leila got a lot of use out of hers-- waving it and marching around like she was part of the parade.

Well, I'm going to leave off at this point because I am having a bit of a struggle getting this blog to do what I want it to do... they changed the format recently and it just doesn't seem as flexible as it did before. Frustration! Anyway, hope all of you are well...