Wonders of Fall

I love fall. It's kind of like spring time. Yes, everything is dying instead of growing, but the weather starts to cool and we can take a break from the scorching heat of the summer. I love pulling out sweaters and jeans. I know that by the time May comes around I will be cursing the winter clothes and counting down the days until I can pull out cute summer clothes, but for now I love the coats and long overalls. FYI, I love Osh Kosh long overalls. Annie has a pair of pink ones with white pin strips. Sadly, when I put them on her today I noticed the snap on one side had broken. So I took a chance and called Osh Kosh. They are sending me a bag to send them the overalls to be repaired if possible or replaced!
Anyway, we had an Enrichment activity last week with fun classes on canning, jam making and how to make a bunch of things with fresh pumpkin. Well, with all the pumpkins we've been bringing home lately, I decided to try it out. I cleaned out the pumpkin, keeping the seeds. I baked the pumpkin flesh until it fell out of the pumpkin skin. That's going to be turned to pumpkin soup tomorrow. Then I set out to make my first ever roasted pumpkin seeds. I roasted them pretty well, but the recipe called to caramelize sugar on the seeds to make them sweet and salty. Well, in the process of melting the sugar, I chard the seeds. Not a little burned so maybe you could salvage them, no, chard black. I completely failed my first attempt at pumpkin seeds. I do have five more pumpkins so I'll have to try again. Hopefully the pumpkin soup is a bigger success.
The other thing I love about fall are the changing leaves and the piles of leaves all over the ground. I grew up in a state with two seasons, summer and very hot summer. I didn't grow up with much exposure to the wonders of orange and red leaves and raking them up into a pile to throw over your head. I'm making up for lost time now. I love throwing leaves at my kids and listening to them scream in delight. Alex is getting good at making his own piles and throwing them way up in the air.