Welcoming Autumn !

This week has truly felt like fall is here. I love fall more than any other time of the year. I especially love fall in the Mid-West. It brings with it apples, and pumpkins, cool crisp nights, bon fires, golden and crimson maples and a general feeling of relaxation. I have missed autumn the last few years living in the south. There was nothing significant to mark the end of summer - it never ends there. : )

Baleigh and I have been enjoying our last few days of summer and celebrating the first signs of fall. This week we canned almost 30 quarts of tomatoes, salsa, and last night habanero jelly to be enjoyed later this year. We picked up the sweet corn we froze earlier this summer from Grandma Jill's this morning now that we have our own chest freezer. Then we headed home to get ready to go to story time at the library. Baleigh is really happy to have some different things to be doing now that big brother is in school. Tuesday is now our library day and starting next Wednesday she will be taking ballet classes up in Monroe, WI. She is SO excited to be starting those classes.

Thor is enjoying school more than we could have ever expected. He has gotten used to riding the bus and has made several good friends at school (some of which live in our neighborhood) and loves his teacher as well. We feel very fortunate that he was able to be in Mr Blakely's class as we thought having a male figure at school would be goo for him. He had a couple of rough days learning that you can't just talk whenever you want and that you have to really learn how to know when it is a good idea to just walk away from someone who might be teasing you instead of lashing out. He seems to have gotten the hang of it rather quickly and has not had an incident in about a week now.

The rest of this week Baleigh and I are going to dedicate to fixing all the little odds and ends projects that we have not completed yet. It seems as soon as we get one job done 15 more pop up to take its place. I can't wait to be fully complete with the house. It will be such an amazing feeling when it is DONE! That should be about when we are ready to sell it. : )

The time has also come to start thinking about Christmas and what we will be doing for that. We know that we will be spending it with Jake's side of the family this year but I need to start working on gifts. This year we have decided to make it all HOME MADE! We will be coming up with more inventive ideas this year on what gifts will mean the most.