Welcome to Autumn Splendor!

 

Perhaps it has something to do with my hair color, but every year when fall settles upon us, my soul is happy and I find genuine contentment with the world around me. The colors! Oh, the colors! Brilliant reds, decadent oranges, deep russets, glowing coppers… the hues that create the palette of fall feel like home to me, and I am at peace.

I’ll admit, there are moments of summer that I adore – the smell of freshly mown hay, the feel of thick green grass below bare feet, an ice cold root beer on a hot day, my mom’s colorful riot of blooming flowers filling the yard of my childhood home. But summer can hold only so much sway over a redhead with pale skin, devoid of any and all ability to tan, who has an ironic allergy to sunscreen. I simply wither when the mercury climbs into the 90s and beyond, and I’ve known my fair share of sunburns. No thank you!

Fall, on the other hand, is another matter entirely. The crisp, cool mornings and late evenings are invigorating. And who can resist the season’s smells? My grandmother’s apple crisp – heavenly. Cinnamon and nutmeg simmering together with apple cider – divine. But the inviting aroma of the crackling wood from a fall bonfire, now that’s the smell of the season I look forward to all year long!

There are those perfect days that come along every once in a while – the ones that you look back on and smile about for years to come. I couldn’t have been older than six or seven. I spent the day raking leaves into big piles with my grandparents in their expansive backyard on their farm. We raked and raked, and then my brothers and I jumped into piles of crunchy red and brown leaves. Later that day, we sat atop straw bales stacked in the wagon as my Grandpa’s red Farmall H chugged us back towards the woods. There, amid yellowing birch leaves and under golden orange hickory tree canopies, my dad and grandpa built a fire. Supper that night consisted of hotdogs cooked on sticks over the flames, golden brown marshmallows and apple cider.

The evening was chilly, but wrapped up in red woolen blankets and gathered around that delicious-smelling fall fire, sitting amid the fallen leaves, listening to my grandparents and parents talk and laugh, life was perfect.

Welcome, Autumn. I’ve missed you.  

In Honor of Grandparents and Patriots

This year, Grandparents’ Day falls on Patriot Day, September 11^th. Sunday will also mark the tenth anniversary of 9/11. It will be a day to remember and honor those who perished in the attacks, as well as celebrate our grandparents.

The significance of both of these important days falling on the same calendar square bears special meaning, I believe. Each year, when September 11^th rolls around, I remember exactly where I was the morning I learned of the attacks. I clearly recount turning on the radio in my car and being confused and bewildered by what I was hearing. Would there be more attacks? Who could do something like this? Was our nation at war? Was my family safe? And then came the news footage and the images. Horrifying.

The event drew to mind an event I’d only ever heard about, something that happened years before I was born. My grandparents were all of the Greatest Generation. They survived and endured through World War II. Each of them could recount where they were and what they were doing when news of the attack on Pearl Harbor came across the radio. I now knew what it was like to look on in horror at a brutal attack against my fellow countrymen and women.

Although Patriot Day endeavors to honor those who lost their lives on 9/11, the day never fails to make me take stock of my own patriotism and love for my country. Much of this I owe to my grandparents. They were a generation of people whose parents risked everything to cross the ocean to come to this land, and throughout my childhood, they painted a very clear picture to me of what it meant to be an American – a deep, undying respect for our nation, reverence for the flag our soldiers fought under through world wars, the pride felt when our country rallies together in times of crisis. Sacrifice, perseverance, and a sense of unity.

My grandmother passed away five years ago. She left behind several books of partially-used ration stamps from the 1940s. I asked her once why she kept them, and mentioned how hard it must have been to struggle to get things like sugar and shoes. Her answer was that she kept them to remember how her family could make it through any hardship, because these were sacrifices that every American was making to aid in the war effort. I always marveled at that measure of patriotism.

This year, on Sunday, September 11^th, my husband will hoist the flag on the pole at our house. I will slice apples with my kids to make a good old fashioned American apple pie, the very recipe my Grandma Mabel taught me to make, and we will share the stories with them of 9/11. We will tell them of the courage and self-sacrifice of the firefighters, police officers, paramedics and first responders who fled to the falling towers to assist their fellow Americans, and how so many of them died in doing so.

Although my grandparents and great-grandparents have all passed on, their memory reminds me of the strength and determination this country was built upon. It makes me happy to think that this Sunday I will celebrate Grandparents’ Day by remembering four people who lived through a critical part of this nation’s history, and passed along those lessons and stories. And I will celebrate Patriot Day, a day to commemorate those who lost their lives to prove that this is still an amazing country, and Americans can still pull together and endure any hardship.

And hopefully, my children will grow to know how fortunate they are to be little Americans.

Family Game Night: Inexpensive Fun for Everyone!

A while ago, my husband and I decided to treat the kids to a 3D movie, complete with a large bucket of popcorn, a 32 oz. Coke and the kids’ choice of candy. One would think a simple outing for a family of four wouldn’t be a budget breaker. There I go assuming again.

After paying for the tickets alone, it dawned on me that with the money we had just spent, we were halfway to the cost of a new Blu-Ray player. Paying for treats had me squirming. Since my husband and I are not immune to the worries of this current recession, we decided to usher in the era of Family Game Night at home. “We can make our own fun for free!” I proclaimed.

Having spent many winter nights at my grandparents’ farm with no cable television and certainly no VCR, I can shake a mean Yahtzee cup. And my older brother schooled me more than once on the financial benefits of setting up hotels on Boardwalk and Park Place (which, as I recall, he always seemed to own). My husband also grew up in a family that eagerly gathers ‘round the table for games, cards and the like. Would we discover our kids had inherited some of these genes?

The following Friday night, my husband and I popped a big bowl of popcorn with the real popcorn popper, which made the kids marvel (“I thought you had to make popcorn in the microwave, mommy. Is this how they did it in the olden days?”), and made me feel old. Then we pulled out Candy Land.

We were off to a roaring start until daddy picked the Queen Frostine card, placing him way ahead of the rest of us. This caused my four-year-old to decide that things were just not fair. I hear ya, kid – mommy never picks the good cards either.

Battleship, on the other hand, was a hit. My daughter was just as into it as my son was. While he spread his boats out across the water, she cloistered all of hers tightly together in one corner. Okay, so she’s no military strategist. “The boats like their friends to be close,” she whispered. The kids soon didn’t need our help anymore with figuring out how to call targets and placing little pegs in their grids. “This is fun!” they both agreed. Total cost of an evening of jubilant game playing around the kitchen table: $1.50 worth of popcorn. That’s recession-proof fun right there, folks!

An overall success, we have expanded our collection of board games. The kids have been known to put down the Wii remotes and ask us to play Mancala or Connect Four. I won’t say that we haven’t taken the kids to a movie since then, but we’ve gotten awfully choosy when it comes to trips to the cinema. We’ve found that there’s a bit more talking and laughing that happens on game night than if we’re sitting in a movie theater eating $8 popcorn. Imagine that!