Walkin' in an Autumn Wonderland



I love fall. 

 

Don't get me wrong, summer is my favorite, but fall seems to be catching up a little each year.  It is so nice when the nights cool off a little and the air just has that certain fall crispness in the mornings.  I love football (except for last week...Go Niners!) so that is another reason to look forward to fall.  And if you know me, you know I loooove me some Halloween.  And wearing boots.  And pumpkin bread.  You get the idea.  But I think my most favorite thing about fall is THIS:

Today while Arden was at school and Cora was at preschool, Dax and I decided to take a hike near our house, and It. Was. Glorious.

With the sun shining through the yellow, orange and red leaves, it was so beautiful it almost didn't look like it could be real:

 

 Little Dax Man was a trooper and (after some bribery) he walked with me up to the lookout where we can see for miles and miles:

 I love being able to spend a couple of hours with my boy by ourselves.  It hasn't happened much in his little life, so I am trying to do fun stuff with him during those rare times when the girls are both at school and I am not at work. 

We had the funniest conversation while we were walking about what Daxton would do if he saw a bear on our hike.  He had two scenarios:  In the first scenario, the bear is a friendly bear, and Dax would go up to the bear and pet it on it's head and say hello.  Then he would ask if he could take a ride on the bear's back so he didn't have to walk.  Next, he would ask if the bear knows any dinosaurs that are hiding in the forest.  In the second scenario, the bear is a mean bear.  If this is the case, Dax would yell at the bear and clap his hands until the bear ran away.  If that didn't work, then Dax said then he would run away FAST FAST FAST back to the car and lock the doors (no word on whether he would wait for me or not).  If that didn't work, then Dax would have to find a great big stick and hit the bear in the nose and the legs and ears and tail until it ran away.  If THAT didn't work, then he would put the bear in timeout for being mean.  Awesome.

I felt like I wanted to just keep following that trail up higher and higher and see how many colors we could find.

Dax, however, wanted to collect on his bribe, so after we reached the lookout we headed back down to the car and hit the bread store, where Dax gobbled up as much cinnamony-bready-carby goodness as he could. 

I was thinking about trying to go hiking again in the morning with Cora while Dax is at preschool, but unfortunately, and my girl does NOT hike.  She gets carried.  And the thought of that makes my arm tired. 

Maybe this weekend I will have the chance to get up there again and soak up some more colors before the leaves all fall down and turn brown and then the trees will be all bare and grayish brown and it will be cold and yucky forever and ever. 

I hate that winter follows fall.