The living room is sparkling with Christmas lights and candles, we have polished off the last of the Thanksgiving leftovers, and the temperature outside has plummeted. African peanut stew (this recipe) is on our menu tonight, but I wanted to take a moment to reflect on the season that has just passed before jumping fully into Christmas.
What We Did This Fall
Our fall weekdays were unusually busy, and our weekends were unusually quiet. We started fall fresh off a trip to Idaho. Our church friends recently moved there, and we went to visit them. I’ve never driven that far north before and was so fascinated by how different the forests were from home. The tree were taller, the needles were different, and even though it was quite dry the air felt more humid. We stayed on a lake, and my children learned how to kayak, and it was a wonderful way to end the summer
.On the way home from Idaho we made a detour to Glacier National Park. My husband has wanted to go there for years, but it was always too far out of the way, so this was our chance! It was a really interesting park to visit - very forested, very mountainous. If you are approaching from the west, you will drive through Kalispell, and Flathead Lake is absolutely huge and breathtaking in itself. Entering the park itself doesn’t feel very impressive at first, but you should definitely try to get a time slot for Going-To-The-Sun road, because it is absolutely worth the drive. The road winds through all these sharp mountains, up a mountain pass with gorgeous views, and beside two beautiful lakes. You can access some pretty cool hiking trails along the road too - we only had time for one, but it was to a waterfall.
Once we arrived home I was immediately thrown back into our homeschool co-op, and I am teaching the middle and high school history for the first time this year. We are learning ancient history, and I think it’s going pretty well. As I type this I am pushing down some anxiety in the back of my mind about the fact that I need to create the fall exam before the kids have to take it on Friday, but it will get done.'
My middle daughter turned ten this fall, and we always throw a friend birthday party for the kids when they turn ten. I chose the easy option and made it a harvest theme, which my daughter was perfectly happy with. We have cupcakes with leaf toppers, leaf scratch art, and beaded corn crafts from Hobby Lobby. I served chili, pickle chips, and pumpkin dip with apples, and we had a campfire with s’mores even though it was sprinkling rain.
We did take some time to go to our local corn maze this fall after skipping it last year, and it was worth the ridiculously high admission. We all came away with pumpkins from the patch, sore feet from walking all through the maze, and the contented type of tired from a fun day together. It was especially delightful for me to see how seriously my older kids took the maze this year.
October was a flurry of chopping wood for the winter and hunting seasons. My husband got a deer and my son got his first elk. Our freezer is pretty full and I am grateful.
We offered to host Thanksgiving for my husband’s parents this year. It was only my second time making a turkey, and my first time making the entire meal myself. I found the trickiest part was getting and keeping everything hot at the same time - the sweet potatoes could have used a little microwaving, but overall it was a success.
Here I am going to explain how I brined the turkey, because I forgot how I did it last time and I want to remember for next time. After defrosting the turkey, remove the neck and innards. Soak it in a solution of water and salt - about half a cup of salt to a gallon of water. Throw some thyme, rosemary, lemon, and cranberries in the brine too (I’m not sure the cranberries did much, but they made it look pretty). Let it soak overnight, up to 24 hours. Remove the turkey from the brine, rub the skin with butter, put a sliced apple and half an onion inside it. Fill the bottom of the turkey bag with carrots, celery, and onion to act as a rack, then put the turkey in. Seal the bag according to the package directions, cook for four hours at 350 degrees, and presto! Flavorful, not-dry turkey.
As we gathered around the table, the Christmas lights already twinkling in the background because we set up our tree the weekend before Thanksgiving, my middle son cheerfully suggested we should all say something we were thankful for. None of us could cover every gift we have received of course. My son chimed in with “I’m thankful for everything!” and that is the closest anyone could come to expressing everything that needs to be said, even if it might feel a little bit like cheating. Everything we have is a gift from God, and we are thankful.
Fall 2025 Favorites:
Beverage: Coffee, just plain coffee,
Meal: Chicken noodle soup, with Grandma noodles of course.
Show: All Creature Great And Small with the kids.
Movie: You’ve Got Mail, we watch it almost every fall and I love it every time.
Activity: Fall hikes in our mountains, and we took several this year.
Book I Read: The Vanishing At Castle Moreau by Jamie Jo Wright - delightfully creepy, but it all turned out alright.
Read-aloud: Anne Of The Island by L. M. Montgomery. We always start a new Anne book in the fall. I’m not sure if we’ll continue into the next books after Anne is all grown up, but we might. I find several of the situations in which Anne finds herself in this current volume are instructive for the teenage years.
Looking Forward To In December:
Family Gatherings: Particularly a “trail of lights” we do with my family every year, and seeing my grandmother in a couple weeks.
Christmas Crafts: I purchased clay snowmen to make, cups to paint, and ornament supplies.
Singing Hymns: I’ve been attempting to learn an old, but new-to-us, hymn with the kids each year. A couple years ago we did “Good Christian Men, Rejoice”, which I think every family should learn because it’s a very enthusiastic song for the younger crowd. Last year we learned “Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence”, which is more somber, but the lyrics really convey the gravity of what Jesus did in becoming a baby. This year we will learn “Gently Mary Laid Her Child”.
Christmas School: We will lighten up on some of our subjects and fill in the gaps with some more festive activities, or put a Christmas spin on some things. I’m still in the planning stages. This Christmas booklist will be used heavily with my little girls.
Sunday School Christmas Party: We still attend a good ol’ fashioned Sunday School, and we will be caroling at our Christmas party this year. I have very fond memories of caroling as a child. If you have never caroled, I hope you get the opportunity someday. The way the door slowly cracks open, and a look of suspicion turns to happy surprise (and sometimes even tears) is something to behold. I hope that some of those memories of giving unexpected joy to a stranger will be formed for my kids this year.
I loved reading all your adventures, and my travel-loving heart wants to visit the west!! Our fave fall adventure was visiting Mackinac Island and doing the Labor Day bridge walk! We are looking forward to enjoying alllllll the trees and celebrating our anniversary!
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