It's in the air...at least in my house

Twenty-three minutes until the timer goes off on my oven. It's 8AM and the first thing on my mind when I rolled out of bed this morning was to bake a cake. I'm not sure where that came from. Most things I like it life are chocolate, but when it comes to cakes, carrot cake is my favorite. I wanted to say "carrot cake takes the cake", but the redundancy and cliche-ness of it would have taken away from it's awesomeness. No nuts or raisins or weird stuff put in it. Just straight up carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.

As the aroma from the cake is eventually making it's way throughout the house, it reminds me that my favorite time of the year is coming up: FALL! I can't think of one single thing that I dislike about fall. Even when my allergies start around August 12th, I still can't help but want to be outside. Crisp, cool air, changing colors of leaves falling to the ground, football, school, baking, hot mochas and hot chocolate, hoodies, making soup...I even like when daylight savings time hits and it gets dark at 6pm. It just means I can light the candles in the house earlier! It is my most reminiscent and relaxing time of year, every single year, without fail. Other than the first year Paul went to Nepal after we just got our 4 month old black lab....that wasn't all that relaxing....

Photo taken at Holmes Lake - Fall 2009

After what is usually a painfully long and frigid winter followed by a short spring and a humid and scorching summer, fall in my reprieve. My exhale. Living in Nebraska, we definitely get a taste of all four seasons in their most intense forms. I remember a couple of years ago, however, it seemed to be the most brilliant of all autumns and it felt like it lasted forever. I would drop the kids off at school and walk around a nearby lake near our house and just take in the glory of the leaves reflecting from the placid water....music in ear, hoodie on head, a slight sight of my cool breath...in the fall, everything just makes sense.

In less than three minutes, I am going to take my carrot cake out of the oven, inhale the waft of fresh carrot cake in my house, close my eyes and have my own 'fall' at my house this morning.