It's Fall

Definitely Autumn around here! Peanut and friends went trick-or-treating and then came back to watch a movie afterwards. I love that he has made friends at school that he feels comfortable inviting over to our house. After meeting them, it feels like he's finding his people for sure. They had a great time gathering way too much candy and watching Haunted Mansion.

I led a hike that morning in Fremont near the bay and had lovely fog to start it off, and it just felt like fall. We found animal tracks and scat and had a great time.

We've had a couple of rainy days already and with the rain, a gorgeous rainbow!

And the rain is also bringing on the mushrooms. This is my favorite season for hikes and walks.

The parking lot at the main library is one of the best spots in town for fall colors.

And I got out for a gorgeous foggy hike this week. 

The fog was making everything better. 

It's nice having a couple days a week with a more flexible schedule for appointments, hikes, and meeting up with friends. I still have a lot of work to do those days, but can fit it around the other things.

Touch of Fall

I've found a few minutes here and there to sneak out for a little fall hiking. 

 

And one of my favorite finds--galls!

These were incredible!

The sky wasn't bad, either.

And the buckeye trees are so fun this time of year as well.

They're like ornaments left hanging on the tree after the leaves all fall. Some of our signs of fall we can find in the hills.

And we may not have a lot of native trees that change colors, but the little pops of color around town are fun.

It's Autumn. . . Sort Of

October is always a back-and-forth month here in the Bay Area. The treats available may all be pumpkiny goodness (this was our lunch on the Sunday of our church conference weekend--with all the Trader Joes fall offerings.)

But the weather is still summer!

Daddy-o and I took the kayak out at Eden Landing and paddled through the marsh to the bay.

We saw a few types of birds, and harbor seals when we got out to the bay, but I think we'll keep exploring for better sites to put in. The water in the canals there looked pretty gross. We ended up each only paddling on one side so we didn't splash water up on ourselves, haha.

And then, we got one last swim of the season--the pool has cooled down a lot, but is still in the mid-70s and with the air temps in the mid-90s, it felt great!

October 7th--our official last day. 

I think the past two years, we haven't made it to October, so I was happy with this. 

We've had some gorgeous sunrises and sunsets lately. October seems to bring the best colors.

And we made it up to Apple Hill to grab some donuts. (The main purpose was to check out a friend's van build and get some pointers before we start ours, but we couldn't pass up the chance for apple cider donuts when we were in the area.)

We've still had beautiful nights for dinner on the patio. This is actually my favorite time for that because it's warm enough to be really comfortable, but also dark enough at dinner to use our lights.

And yet, with all the summer weather we've been having, we also got just enough rain to start off mushroom season and I'm already seeing fungi poking out from all types of places.

And we're getting the start of the trees changing colors. We have a lot of evergreens, but always enjoy the few trees that do change. We're still probably a few weeks away from needing jackets all day and turning on the heat, but summer is pretty much wrapping up.

A Day with John Muir

Since Covid, we haven't had too many opportunities for field trips other than those that I plan, but our charter school has started their trips back up and Peanut and I were able to join in on a trip to the John Muir National Historic Site.

We toured the house that his family lived in for the last 24 years of his life.

It was given to them by his wife's parents, on their family orchard, and more opulent than Muir would have chosen, but it's a beautiful house.

It's always a little amazing to be able to walk in the same places as someone who we've read and learned so much from. Although most of the furniture isn't original, the desk in his office is.

And they have this self-portrait hanging in the room as well. (I think Muir's people sketching abilities are not his strongest talent, haha.)

It was a beautifully drizzly day.

Peanut was happy to find a couple friends on the field trip who he knows from our nature group. We got to go see the bell they would ring for dinner, and the kids all got to ring the bell later.

Peanut was soaking in everything. We had watched the video the NPS created about Muir and read a couple books about him in our history study recently, so he had a solid background and was excited to see this area.

Besides touring the house, we also walked around the grounds.

Muir planted a giant sequoia at his home. It's not the healthiest tree, being isolated from other trees and not in its natural habitat, but Muir wanted to have one of the trees he loved close by when he wasn't in Yosemite.

The ranger spent a while talking with the kids about the NPS and what these parks are. Muir was such a key part of this whole system we now have.

It's beginning to look like autumn around here! 

We Know It's Fall When. . .

Our mantle gets a makeover.

Some years I've gone with a more spooky look for October, but this year, I only added a couple of our Halloween decorations and mostly went for classic fall.

Love my little nature collections tray--there are so many great things to collect in the fall.

The guavas are ripe.

I look forward to this season every year. No one else in my house seems to care, but this fruit is full of nostalgia for me, as well as being really tasty.

Water polo is going full steam. This has been a rough season for Bug. He's personally having his best year yet, but his coach seems to have given up on the boys and is providing very little coaching or encouragement. It's been frustrating and I know Bug is looking forward to the club season starting next month (with a different coach who he actually likes), but he's trying to stick with it. He's been shooting a lot more this year and has scored some really beautiful goals, as well as getting a lot of assists (or, a high percentage--considering how badly they have lost some of their games, there isn't always a lot of scoring going on by anyone on their team.)

The Halloween House comes out.

This is actually not something we usually do, but Peanut had been asking about buying one of these kits, so I surprised him with it one day. And then the frustration with the frosting started and I remembered why I don't really care to do these, haha. Probably skip the gingerbread houses this year.

We get a new spooky game. We've played 13 Dead End Drive the past couple years, but this year, since Peanut and Daddy-o had just been to Disneyland, I decided to pick up the Haunted Mansion game when I saw it on a crazy sale. It's a really fun game and a nice addition to our fall-themed games.

The houses are decorated for Halloween.

There's a really fun street in Pleasanton that Peanut and I discovered last year, so we took Daddy-o and Bug this year to see the area.

Nothing quite lives up to the house we saw in New Orleans a few years ago, but there are some fun ones here, as well.

And, finally, the Primary program at church happens. These two cute boys were the narrators and did a fabulous job at their last ever Primary program. In January, they move up to the youth program, which is hard to believe, but they certainly are seeming responsible and mature these days.