It's fall y'all!

I have a subscription to Southern Living magazine, which I greatly enjoy.  Everything in it is so pretty and quaint and well done, which is a nice escape sometimes from the reality around here where everything is pretty, but covered in pee; quaint, but covered in pee; and well done, but covered in pee.  And dog hair.  More than once I've found myself feeling like a stranger looking in on the world of Southern Living.  For example, I don't iron my sheets.  I don't have time and also THAT'S CRAZY.  I don't really even iron my clothes.  (Shout out to my amazing husband, Kevin, who irons his own shirts!!!)  Also most of the recipes, though enticing, require more than 3 ingredients and almost never involve a can of cream of chicken soup or hot dogs.  But the folks at Southern Living and I could not be more on the same page this month!  We are on the same page about fall, specifically Halloween.

Here's my deal with Halloween.  It's ugly.  Our household Halloween decorations include the decoupaged word "Boo" on our front door, three plastic placemats and a hand towel with a spider on it.  Like the SL editor says, "All this month's glorification of death and dismemberment runs counter to the beauty of changing leaves, cooler temperatures and warm casseroles popping right out of the oven....There's enough angst in the world these days, and folks seem plenty on edge without editors like me having to come up with new ways to frighten their friends and neighbors."  Okay, so it's not cooler and there really is no changing leaf color in Houston, but his point is well taken.  Don't we have something better to celebrate?

Also, I'm a huge chicken.  I never could, and still can not, watch a scary movie.  I am 33 and the idea of zombies terrifies me.  Most people cross a line into adulthood and are able to laugh at the absurdly horrible, can celebrate Halloween as nothing more than a day to have some fun and mock death, even go so far as to celebrate that Christ overcame it.  I just can not.  It is too darn ugly.

All that being said, yes, I take my kids trick-or-treating.  In case they develop the ability to grow up like reasonable unafraid adults, I do not want to hinder that.  Also, boys generally don't think zombies are gross.  So I will continue to keep my issues as my own and consider the candy I steal from them as retribution for my silence.

But there are indeed better things to celebrate.  Fall reminds us that things change, and, with God's grace, do so beautifully (even in Houston).  We move into the season of Thanksgiving and are reminded how important counting our blessings really is.  We are given respite from the heat of summer and its long, crazy days.  Whether you have a huge, fake fuzzy spider in your yard with glowing eyes and skeletons hanging from your trees (arg....) or not, I hope you take some time today to welcome fall into your heart, and all that God has given us to celebrate in this season of life. 

XOXO....Kelly