The first day of fall

Honestly, I didn't even realize that today was officially autumn.

The little boys spent most of the morning in front of the tv. I don't like to admit it, but yes, somtimes I use the evil evil electronic box in the living room as a free babysitter. Today I needed to be domestic. There was more laundry to be done, and I figured I would go for the gold medal of all domesticness by preparing supper in the morning. No, not in the crock pot. No, not by buying a couple frozen pizzas. I actually made a pan of lasagna at 9 am. That effort alone should earn me a few nights off of supper duty don't you think? Ok, back to the day. I was feeling some tinges of guilt from letting them watch re-runs of Diego . The show is new and I've already heard him save the red-eyed tree frogs at least six times. We headed outside. The weather was gorgeous, one of those days where fall can't make up it's mind. One minute you are chilly, so you grab a hoodie, the next minute the sun comes out from behind a cloud and you're suddenly very warm.

We mowed. Not all of us of course. Gemma and I did though. The white noise of the mower always puts her to sleep. Caedmon and Jack were busy with "Junior" the cricket that Caedmon caught. It was a big old nasty one and Caedmon was carrying it around the yard by one of it's back legs. He put it in a big pot of dirt. (There is a huge pot by the garage that I never planted anything in.....except dirt) Caedmon kept putting the cricket in the pot, covering it up with dirt, and then calling out "Junior? Junior? Where are you?" It was the most one-sided game of hide-and-go-seek I have ever seen. Jack just stood by the pot and threw big clumps of dirt on the sidewalk.

One thing I love about EARLY fall is that not very many leaves have fallen yet, and you can just mow over them a couple times and it's as good as raking. So I can add that to my list of things I accomplished today. Mowed AND raked.

As I was mowing and thinking about fall, I started having thoughts about pumpkins. Those pumpkin thoughts led to thoughts of pumpkin pie, and then to pumpkin bars with cream cheese frosting. After a few more passes across the lawn I was pretty sure that it was only the cream cheese frosting that I really cared about. I didn't really WANT to make bars, I just wanted to eat them. And I had already put WAY too much effort into supper, I needed a no-brainer dessert. So I made one up. I stopped at the store, picked up a spice cake mix, a can of pumpkin, and a can of cream cheese frosting. Instant satisfaction. I think Iv'e already had three pieces tonight.

Happy Autumn to you all.