Mid Autumn Scenes from Around the Neighborhood

When it snowed a couple of weeks ago before we had even had a frost, I groaned, thinking for sure that all the leaves on the trees would not even get a chance to turn before they shriveled up brown and dropped to the soggy ground. But strangely enough, even though we had a couple of inches of snow on the ground at one point (nothing compared to the several feet that our neighboring state faced) the temperature actually didn’t go below freezing even though it was snowing, and it didn’t really seem to phase the trees or even the flowers in our yard. The autumn colors have been beautiful despite the crazy weather (not only did we have snow, but in the past few weeks we’ve also had rain, rain, and more rain, gale force winds, and just kind of crazy weather in general mixed in with a few days of sunshine.)

I haven’t managed to get out into the forest very much this fall, although The Devious Snail and I did go on a great hike last weekend because the weather was just too good to pass up even though I was battling a nasty cough. I think this is partly because our fall has been very busy with activities and students, and partly because my hiking buddy, The Banana, who is always ready to hop into some good walking shoes and head to the trail with me has a broken ankle. It’s pretty hard to hike with crutches.

I have, however, been enjoying shorter neighborhood walks that I’ve been able to squeeze in. And the baby and teenager trees in my yard have not disappointed this season.