Fall Fest: L is for Leaves

Leaves

I must admit, the thing I miss most about living in Louisville, Kentucky (or Northern Georgia, or Ohio, or New York) was the beautiful sight of leaves changing.  There were points all along my drive to and from work where the vibrant colors of fall were breathtaking.  Reds, oranges, and golds lined the streets.  The drive to Bellarmine University (the Catholic university where Heather and I both worked... not to mention Stacie, Tera, and some other HLA readers) was capped off each morning with a picturesque drive leading onto campus.  It was lined with trees that turned so red, from afar they looked like burning bushes (appropriate, I know).

School doesn't start until after Labor Day in New York, so one of first, most memorable, assignments of the school year, was always collecting leaves for a creative assignment of some sort.  I remember pressing leaves between waxed paper; identifying the trees from which the assortment of leaves fell; categorizing them by colors, sizes, and shapes; and using leaves for all sorts of art projects.  Yes, while falling leaves signified the end of summer, they also meant the beginning of a new school year.  

I love fall leaves.

• I loved raking them up in to a neat pile, only to jump into them with two feet.
  
• I loved burying my friends under leaves.
  
• I loved getting paid $1.00 per full bag of raked leaves, by my dad.
  
• I loved making leaf angels, in anticipation of the snow angels that would come months later.
  
• I loved the smell of burning leaves.
  
• I loved (and still love) stepping on brown leaves and listening to the crunching sound below my feet.
  
• And, in a few weeks when leaves start falling in North Texas, I will love watching my boys romp around in the leaves - creating their own favorite fall memories.
  

Today let's talk leaves.  Do you have a fun (or funny) leaf story?  I do.  When I was in high school and my boyfriend lived in Arizona (where he wasn't treated to beautiful fall leaves), I mailed him a box of fall leaves from New York.

Do you have a favorite craft project using leaves?  Wrapping paper? Place mats?

Or, have your just decided to turn over a new leaf and to use today's post as a chance to tell us about it?

Maybe you don't even want to talk about leaves.  Maybe you're allergic and you hate the fact that they make you sneeze.  Maybe you have a different word starting with the letter "L" that makes you think about fall.  If that's the case, tell us about that (maybe you'll hit on the "L" word I have lined up for tomorrow). 

Signing off until tomorrow...