A Brave Writer's Life in Brief

We made a list of things to do in the summer and one of our BW moms asked me to make one for fall.

1. Of course buy pumpkins and carve/decorate them. You can use those big quilting pins to pierce the pumpkins so that you can cut colored paper and pin ears, eyes, mouths, if you prefer (a Mr. Pumpkin Head ala Mr. Potato Head).
2. Make a chart that tracks the color changes of leaves on one of your trees. Sharpie mark several leaves with numerals. Then each day, record how the colors change for each one. Do you see speckles? Streaks? Shading shifts from left to right or top to bottom? Bring your colored pencils and compare colors to the leaves and then name the colors (goldenrod, chartreuse, ruby).
3. Serve hot apple cider during your teatime/poetry for the months of October and November.
4. Rake leaves for a neighbor while that neighbor is at work. Leave pumpkin muffins and an anonymous note. Don’t ever say who raked the yard.
5. Jump on the trampoline and take flying photos.
6. Hike to a creek with your dog.
7. Stay out late and look at the moon once per week. Draw it and notice how the shape changes over the course of a month.
8. Borrow a telescope and find Saturn.
9. Create a nature’s table where you collect and display fall-ish items: acorns, acorn hats, moss on bark, dried colored leaves, scented candles, little pumpkins or gourds, blond hay stalks, dried corn, pebbles. We like to add little figurines like Half Penny Dolls. Lego figures work too.
10. Read and write poems about the fall.
11. Use sidewalk chalk to create hopscotch (look up various versions on the Internet and try them all).
12. Volunteer at a homeless shelter and serve.
13. Roast marshmallows in the fireplace.
14. Peel an apple in one long peel using a pocket knife.
15. Bake pies (try new ones like rhubarb, or old ones in a new way – pumpkin using a real pie pumpkin, not canned).
16. Shake whipping cream in a glass jar with a marble until it become butter. Take turns shaking during read aloud time.
17. Dye fabric with natural foods: beets to make purples, red onions for reds, tumeric for yellows. Muslin works great. You can make bean bags or little quilted pot holders with the resulting fabrics.
18. Find out how to play cornhole. (Cincinnati specialty!) Then make one and try it.
19. Take a bird watching hike (bring binoculars and a field guide). You can sometimes sign up at local nature preserves or parks too.
20. Toss the old pigskin around!
21. Buy a candle making kit and make the candles (or paper making or soap making).
22. Clean the messiest space in your house, then scent the room with lavender.
23. Spend an evening eating popcorn, drinking cider, and reading silently as a family in front of the fire. Turn the TV off.
24. Go to a local festival.
25. Invite college students or adults living alone to an evening of soup, bread and games (like Apples to Apples). Fall is a great time to care for shut ins or kids who have moved away from home.

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