Weekly Winners (October 16 – 22)

Weekly WinnersWeekly Winners is a fun little thing bloggers do to showcase some of their favorite photos from the previous week. It is brought to you, me and everyone by the lovely Lotus, aka Sarcastic Mom. Visit her site and find all the participants. See some amazing photos brought to you by bloggers around the world. Leave a little love when you do — its like food for the soul!

Photos taken using my Droid Incredible or a Sony DSLR A230.
View all of my photos on my Flickr stream.

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I was pretty artistically stale this week. I didn’t write much, and more than once this week, my photo of the day was approached with a “whatever” attitude. This coming week will be different. Of this I am certain…

341: Pattern
Pattern

342: Leaves continue to change
Leaves continue to change

343: Top Shelf
Top Shelf

344: Purposely Blurred
Purposely Blurred

345: Rings reflected
Rings reflected

Soft light
Soft light

346: Marker Lights
Marker Lights

Grapes
Grapes

347: Hole in my jeans
Hole in my jeans

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Thanks for viewing! Now go visit Lotus and find all the WW participants.
Leave a little love when you do — its like food for the soul!

My obsession with Fall

Fall leavesIf you search my Flickr photostream for the word “Fall” you get 136 photos back… a lot when you consider that I’m pretty sure I’ve failed to tag all my fall photos with “Fall” and I’ve only been seriously keeping up my Flickr page for about three years.

Growing up in Texas, Fall basically meant football season. The temperatures would go from sweltering to warm with the occasional chill in the wind. Past that, Fall = Football. Period.

Oh okay, it meant a bunch of birthdays, Halloween and Thanksgiving. And school pictures. But past that? Fall colors were what you saw only by cutting out construction paper leaves. You saw them in decorations bought at arts & crafts fairs. Or you saw them in magazines and on TV. But in Texas? It just goes summer leaves to no leaves at all in the blink of an eye. No magical color change.

Then I moved to Tennessee.

I still remember I had just recently moved here, and I was driving to our apartment from the store and I was struck by the colors all around me. I called my brother to squeal on his voicemail about how pretty it was. I don’t know why that memory remains with me, but it does.

Fall tends to not love me back. I get a yearly sinus infection, and I end up staring out the window at the pretty in misery. But it never stops me from still anticipating the season with glee.

My first visit to a "pumpkin patch" in 2006

Pumpkin patches to visit. Corn mazes to traverse.

There’s Pumpkin Spiced Lattes to drink.

Its time to get out warmer clothing.

And the colors… oh the colors! It starts with a little tinge of color in a tree here and a tree there. Then you start to notice all the trees are slowly changing from green to reds, yellows and oranges. The leaves that have already fallen crunch under your feet as you walk through the grass, and they speckle the drive way with their brilliant beauty.  Sometimes when the wind blows, they fall around you like glitter.

My husband and I like to go on drives through the country to look at all the colors. Those construction paper leaves of elementary school have nothing on the real thing! I stare out the window — be it my living room window or the passenger side window of our truck — in awe. Mesmerized by the changes this season brings.

We’ve had our first freeze warning of the year… though the extreme cold is short lived for now. We’ll be back in the 70s this weekend, just in time for a group trip to a corn maze where we’ll laugh and get lost among the cornstalks. A hayride will make us feel like kids again, and a cup of apple cider will warm the soul as much as the tummy.

Yes, Fall is definitely my favorite season of the year. And I plan to enjoy everything I can about it before winter gets its grip on the area.