Today.

 Today we played outside.  The boys climbed everything.  Who needs fancy swing sets when you have dead tree stumps and logs rotting away?

 Bitsy was in balance beam heaven.  Mama was surprised at the number of trees down in our back lot.  This is when the reality of all the time I lost this summer finally set in.  I didn't recognize our back 40.

 So I sat and watched the goings on in my fold up chair.  This shot reminds me of Alice in Wonderland.

 I'm opening out like the largest telescope that ever was! Good-bye, feet!" (for when she looked down at her feet, they seemed to be almost out of sight, they were getting so far off) "Oh, my poor little feet, I wonder who will put on your shoes and stockings for you now, dears? I'm sure I shan't be able! I shall be a great deal too far off to trouble myself about you: you must manage the best way you can - but I must be kind to them," thought Alice, "or perhaps they won't walk the way I want to go! Let me see: I'll give them a new pair of boots every Christmas."

And she went on planning to herself how she would manage it. "They must go by the carrier," she thought; "and how funny it'll seem, sending presents to one's own feet! And how odd the directions will look!

Alice's Right Foot, Esq., Hearthrug, near the Fender. (with Alice's love.)

 Husband was burning off a huge stump in the back lot and hauling off limbs from the downed trees.  But all work and no play makes Husband a dull FarmBoy, so he had to get in a bit of tree climbing.  Sometimes I think he forgets he's no longer 17 years old.

 Yesterday he discovered a persimmon tree we didn't realize was there.  Last fall I found a single persimmon on the ground near this tree, but no matter how much I searched, I couldn't find any more nor where the one came from.  Now we know and that means there are persimmon cookies in our future.

 A much smaller fire was built in the front yard so we could enjoy a wiener roast.

 Misha Gale deluded herself into believing she would be getting a wiener so she stood sat guard.

 OK, so I did give her the very last bite of mine.  Who can resist those eyes?  (Actually, Busha could.  She thinks their unnerving.)

 The last of the dandelion puffs are giving it a brave go in my yard.  I hate to be the one to tell them their time is almost over.

 The Autumn Olives, on the other hand, are resplendent.  A punch of color in the dying underbrush of our woods.

 Acorns and mushrooms are also plentiful at the moment.  I may try to talk the FarmHands into collecting a bucket of acorns for my dinning room table again.  Nothing says fall to me like an acorn cap.

 The colors are beginning to creep up.  Soon we'll be surrounded by yellow.

 But personally I'm a bigger fan of the reds and purples scattered between the hickory trees.

 

 My Father-in-Law has turned his cows out to pasture since we're past the time for cutting hay.   I love to see them roaming about.  Lilly May and Buddy Joe, however, are not quite as welcoming.

 My zinnias bloomed rather late due to the total lack of water this summer.  I'm not sure who this is, but I am glad I saw her before I tried to pick the flower.  Perhaps she knows Charlotte.

 Cocks Comb will never cease to fascinate me with it's color and texture and the sheer strangeness of it.  It's the one "flower" that did well at our house despite the drought.

And finally, a grey grasshopper enjoys the last of my roses as a mid-afternoon snack.  At least he waited until the colors faded and the bloom began to droop.