Better Late than Never

It seemed like it took fall a while to get here this year.  Not the actual date, but the colors.  The weather stayed warm and the leaves stayed green longer than in past years, or so it seemed.  But when they did arrive, they were glorious.  The oranges and yellows looked especially vibrant.

Isaac and I were driving home one afternoon close to 5:00, after Daylight Saving Time had ended, so dusk was only about 30 minutes away.  It was one of those perfect times when the angle of the sun was just right and hitting the leaves at just the right spot that it almost seemed as if they glowed. I should have stopped to take a picture, except I don't do things like that and I wouldn't have been able to capture the image well enough to do the colors justice.  But I can still see them when I close my eyes, so maybe they will stay with me long enough to get me through the long, gray days ahead.

I realized, now that the leaves have fallen and been raked and bagged, that I had not included any fall books in my posts this month.  While we were raking leaves in our friend's yard over the weekend, a couple came to mind as I watched Isaac hesitantly jump into the piles that we had made.

Fall Leaves Fall By Zoe Hall and It's Fall! by Linda Glaser are two that I like to read to my classes each year.  They celebrate the colors and the changes of the season.  It's Fall is especially lovely, with its collage art illustrations.  Of course, they include the obligatory science connections (animals hibernating or migrating or  otherwise adapting to the colder weather, temperature changes, how humans adjust).  But they are fun to read and pretty to look at.

So put them on your list for next year when you are waiting for colors that don't seem to want to show themselves. Or read them at the end of January when you need an infusion of color in those long gray days.