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There are still 14 days of summer left, and I'm the very last person to wish away summer. It's looking less likely that I'll be getting any more beach days - at least not days where it's hot enough to go swimming - and that breaks my little heart.  My little pumpkin will turn one year old in November, so I'm frantically pumping the brakes on the change in season this year.

BUT. Fall is starting to creep in, slowly but surely. It's getting dark at 8:15. Some of the leaves in our backyard are tinged with red. Pumpkin drinks are back, shorts and sundresses are on clearance racks, apparently football has started, and there's juuuust a little tiny nip in the air in the mornings, just enough to say, oh no, you're not getting in the pool today. Go put on some pants. 

As much as I love my beach days, ice cream and not wearing socks, fall is my favourite season. Many of my best memories are of things that happened in the fall: getting engaged, getting married, getting our dog, and having a baby. I love Thanksgiving and Halloween. I love fall food and drinks, the fairs and exhibitions, scary movies, crafts, you name it.

Things I'm looking forward to:

[+] Crafternoons aplenty. Thanks, Pinterest, for feeding my addiction for homemade wreaths, centrepieces, and mantel arrangements. I hate crafting in the summertime. It's so nice outside and it feels like a waste of a sunny day to sit in the basement wrapping yarn around some inanimate object, but in the fall, when it gets dark early, there's nothing much cosier than a warm mug of something, a glue gun and the soft glow of the laptop screen showing me step-by-step instructions of some "easy" craft that ends up looking like a drunk preschooler put it together by the time I'm done with it.

[+] Baking a pumpkin pie PUMPKIN EVERYTHING. "What's your favourite pie?" Peter asked me the other day and I went into a (not kidding) 10-minute-minimum spiel about how different seasons require different pies and then proceeded to hum and haw over my favourite pie for each time of year. (Summary: Spring is strawberry rhubarb, summer is blueberry, fall is pumpkin, and winter is apple or cherry). ANYWAY. Making a pumpkin pie, pumpkin granola, pumpkin quinoa salad, pumpkin soup, et cetera is all on the agenda.

[+] Apple picking and pumpkin patch visiting. Last year I was busy sitting on the couch with my legs clamped tightly together so my misbehaving fetus wouldn't be born prematurely and I missed our annual apple picking trip. Not this year, kiddos. I am going to pick so many apples and take so many photos of Eli sitting inside, beside and on top of pumpkins it's going to make you SICK.

[+] Thanksgiving dinner. I don't need to explain myself on this one. Thanksgiving is bomb because it's all the food and family brouhaha of Christmas without the expense of all those gifts.

[+] Becoming an aunt for the second time! My sister is due September 30 and I can't wait to meet little Baby P.

[+] Eli's first Halloween. It will probably be pretty uneventful, since he goes to bed at 7:00 and can't eat candy, but putting a little costume on him is going to be probably the highlight of my year.

[+] Eli's birthday. OK, this is a bit of a happysad occasion but I'm still excited to see Eli tear into his first piece of cake like a wild man.

[+] Football games. I only understand about 10% of what happens in any given football game, but I like to pretend I'm following along. In high school I went to every game and it was really just a chance to socialize, walk past the opposing school's bleachers 20,000 times to make fun of them, and go to Wendy's at halftime. So I probably have a subliminal association that football = Wendy's. Mmm, son of a baconator.

Honourable mentions go to: scary movies, fires in the fireplace, the Fall Fair at home, wearing leggings and boots, enough Pumpkin Spice Lattes to fill a bathtub, long walks in crunchy leaves, buying new "school supplies" for the return to work, and putting the duvet back on the bed.