Falling for Fall

It is not unknown that I am a solar-powered gal. I love the heat and the sun and my vacations usually involve going farther south than my location at 33.09 degrees N and 97.06 degrees W of the equator. I love everything about any weather that offers temperatures of 85 degrees or higher....

But, I'm coming to love the seasons, including the cooler ones (it's hard to say cold in Texas, relatively speaking). First off, I'm a person that thrives on change. I have no problem changing paint colors on my wall regularly and it's not unheard of for my husband and I to switch furniture around in our house about once a month. I love to change my haircut (and I'm not talking about taking an extra 1/2 inch off my head...I'm talking, to use Jason's terminology so pardon me, balls out going from long hair to having a pixie-like hairdo change) and I love to change my obsessions pretty regularly like all of a sudden having a bizarre fascination with peacocks to wanting nothing in my closet but knit sweaters. My taste in music is erratic - one day I'm a country girl, the next I only listen to jazz and, as of this moment, I'm really into rock.

I'm a person of extremes and my extremes sway pretty regularly...it's an off day if I'm normal. I get to live a very blessed life that involves no schedules, other than taking my son to school and picking him up, no routines (although is it considered routine to have no routine? I shall think endlessly about this tonight) and a complete lack of rules and regulations. But I like to go with the wind, as opposed to going with the flow...there is a difference, didn't you know that? I should have been a hippie is all I'm saying, I was just born about 30 years too late to be old enough to belong to that culture.

So change is good and Fall is change so I'm embracing it. The colors I see are beautiful, the sun shows up at different angles and times of day. The light is softer, more cozy, and for some strange reason, I'm more apt to exercise when I'm bundled up (shouldn't I be more concerned about my physique when it's swimsuit season?).

With all that said, my son is very persistent that "cold is his favorite season". And we had enough fall leaves in our yard to warrant raking them up this evening. My arms were broken so I couldn't rake with Lawyer but I was able to take pictures (haha).

Ah, yes, look at the exuberance in his face when we gave him a rake.

Get to work, kid!

It's not all fun-and-games when you have to rake leaves on a 50 degree incline!

Hey, kid, I didn't say you could take a break!

What do you mean you're only 4 years old and there are child-labor laws to protect you against this sort of thing? Now get back to work!

Hey, what are you doing? There's no laying down on the job! Get up!

Hmm, I can't depend on our help around here for nothing.

And by the way, just in case you are wondering why my pictures are so grainy, because I know that's exactly what you were thinking, it was because it was VERY dark outside...I'm surprised I even got half-decent pictures to begin with. I had to use my 50mm lens set at it's highest aperture setting of f/1.8 with my ISO set at 1600 so that's that. But thank goodness for the f/1.8 50mm lens though or I wouldn't have had any pictures to share at all!