Fall leaves, a power outage, and related adventures

I've been trying to get this post written for a week, and life keeps happening. Anyway, last Friday afternoon I noticed that the tree outside my bedroom window was casting a gorgeous golden glow on the wall opposite. I was going to note this fact to the wide web, but then I discovered I'd gone off and left my power cord at the library, and by the time this had been rectified my afternoon was mysteriously over.

Then I had kind of a surreal experience. Out front, the ground was covered by bright red and yellow leaves. I went out the back door and had to blink a few times, because everything was in drab greens, grays, and blacks. Leaves on the ground in October aren't supposed to be black. Something had obviously drained the world of its proper color! Was there a weird filter on my glasses? Were my eyes having trouble adjusting to outdoors?? HAD SOMEONE STOLEN MY WARM TONES?

I looked up. The big maple out back had no red on it at all. The green leaves were turning black and falling off, and that's what I was seeing all over the grass. What a disappointment.

On Wednesday, day before yesterday, it was hot and muggy as all-get-out. Finally, late afternoon, we had a five-minute tropical storm blow through complete with tornado warning. The rain pounded down in a thick gray wall, and when it blew away, the power had gone with it and there was a beautiful deep puddle on our front steps!

So Jonathan and I jumped in it, and then we folded boats and set them asail. Mine carried a cargo of jewel-toned leaves.


We came inside and dried off our feet and waited for the power to come back on. I lit candles. We staved off dinnertime with handfuls of Cheerios. I played with my new camera until it ran out of battery.

Meg woke up. By this point it was really dark, despite candles. So we all packed up and went to IHOP for dinner, where we played Pass the Pigs and Meg helped eat our hash browns and flirted with the waitress. And when we came home around 8:30, the power was back on. Yay!

Thursday mornings, Andi comes over with the twins she nannies and we try to do crafts. So yesterday I revved up the evil-minded sewing machine, which had been working great earlier in the week, and... it had ceased to work. The machine worked just fine if I cranked around it by hand, but the foot pedal would go up and down and fail to relay any information to the machine. The power returning must have fried its circuits. I can't think what else could have done it. I think it has bitten the dust for good this time. Sad days! But all is not lost - Andi kindly lent me her sewing machine so I can put together Meg's fairy skirt.