autumn

Nov 2, 2009

I love the fall. Love it. I love the colors, the weather with warmth in the day and crispness at night. I love the smells of harvest. I love taking walks and swinging my feet through piles of leaves. I love thinking about what I want to make as Christmas presents for loved ones.

One early fall day back in 2003, I was visiting with my friend Delinda and I said “This is a perfect day. It is a perfect day to have a baby. I would love to be giving birth on a day like today.” Now, when I said this I had just had my fifth miscarriage in a row and didn’t think I would ever be giving birth again. But as we walked around my yard, I kept telling her how perfect that September day was for giving birth.

And then by a miracle of God, I DID give birth the next September, on a perfect fall day to have a baby and Fisher joined my life and wrapped himself around my heart in a way that I can’t even explain.

I have had 3 of my children born in the fall, and although I have always said I want a springtime baby (You know, don’t you, that it is the ideal time to have baby, right? Have you heard my three summer plan for why springtime babies are best? See note below if you have somehow missed my lecture on this important aspect of childbearing, haha!) I think fall babies are pretty wonderful as well.

Now fall is almost over. We are into November! How did this happen? How did the glorious month of October get away from me without a single hike to the hills? How did I miss taking pictures of the leaves in my yard?

We had meal-in-a-pumpkin tonight for dinner tonight and it was delicious! Talk about a fabulous fall supper. It took me right outside into the leaves, smells, and beauty of fall.

Enjoy these last few weeks (please tell me there are weeks, not days left) of fall and I will try my darndest to get out on a nice fall hike!

***The Three Summer Plan For Why Springtime Babies Are Ideal***
If you get pregnant in July, you can still wear your bathing suit, shorts, and hiking clothes all summer long. You can even still go backpacking. When Christmas rolls around and it is time for all those holiday parties, you will be a nice 6 months pregnant and be looking adorably round without feeling like you are beached whale. You will still have enough energy to make and shop for Christmas presents. You will have a built in heater to keep you warm through those frigid days and nights. You can wear maternity sweaters, long sleeves to hide saggy upper arms, and there is no reason you need to don a swimming suit when you aren’t feeling your most svelte self. The holiday season always flies by and that will help your second trimester fly by as well. Then, you just get to hibernate and enjoy the rest of winter and the coming of spring without a lot of time commitments or parties to dress up for. Then, the days start getting warmer just in time for you to give birth in April. You have a glorious birth in the springtime sunshine along with the baby chicks, calves, ducklings, and sheep. You don’t have to bundle your baby up in 10 million layers to keep them warm when you go out, it is warm! You will have April and May to get back into your summer clothes and by the time summer is full blown, your baby will be a great nurser and you will have adjusted to motherhood. Your baby will be big enough to carry around in a mei-tai all summer long and they will not be scrambling to get out and crawl around in the dirt. They will be content to be carried. By the time Christmas rolls around, your baby will still be in the crawling stage and will not try to climb the Christmas tree (unless they take after Keziah!). They will not have hit the famous 9-12 month stranger anxiety stage and grandparents and aunts and uncles will love holding your adorable baby. By the time the next summer arrives, your baby will be a quite competent walker and you will not have to endure a summer camping season digging dirt, twigs, and rocks out of your baby’s mouth. They will be able to toddle around camp like a pro. They will be over stranger anxiety just in time for all the family reunions.

So there you go, the 48 reasons why I have always said spring is the ideal time to have a baby. For some reason, all my babies conceived in June-August haven’t made it into my arms. My babies like me to endure the heat of summer while I am hugely pregnant and to give birth in the fall. So I guess fall is the ideal time for me to have a baby.

And that is perfectly okay with me because I get to hold them in my arms everyday.