Hello FALL!!!!!!

I know, we still have a week before it's "officially" Autumn (I'm all too familiar with the official arrival of Fall; it was the reason my wedding colors included teal and not aquamarine. Don't groan too loudly--it was 1989!), but considering how hot and steamy the weather has been in the last two months, we are REALLY ready for this. Fall came loudly to North Alabama last night with a strong but short-lived thunderstorm ahead of a rather powerful (yay!!!) cold front. When we got home from Bible study last night, the temperature inside the house was 82. When we woke up this morning, it was 70, and half of the windows were still closed to keep the rain out!!!

We have had a very dry summer. Not as dry as Texas, but still dry enough that the trees started to show signs of stress a few weeks ago. In fact, our catalpa tree out front has lost about half of its leaves already, and several of the trees in the back are almost completely yellow (and dried out). Today, though, with the gray and dreary cloud cover, the still-damp ground, and the brisk breeze, it looks like FALL!!!!

The view down the street. Just past our nextdoor neighbor's house is a hay field that was cut and baled this week!

In the backyard ...

Ooooooh, check out what ELSE I came across this morning!!!! I am actually a day ahead of the game, so I am seriously going to "play" this year!

I have some seriously intense crafting (sewing, actually) projects to get started on for Christmas but first I have to get my housecleaning finished so we can be ready for our End-of-Summer BBQ after church this Sunday! I'll be blogging about my sewing project, I have already had a couple of people on Facebook ask about it, I'll just have to be careful so the recipients don't sneak a peek! 

Today is a wonderful day to look ahead to all that the next couple of months brings, so I decided to sip my coffee from my CHRISTMAS mug this morning! Yes, I know, it's early. WAY early. I just wanna, ok???