Fall foliage

After two months of lovely progression, all the trees in our yard have finally finished dropping their leaves.

The process starts in mid-September, when the honey locust leaves start carpeting the path through the yard.

By this point, the oaks starts showing just a wee bit of color.

But October – ah, that's the glorious month. By the first, things are really ramping up.

Every leaf becomes a thing of beauty.

It helps to have sunny days during this month, as it makes things positively sparkle.

You see, this is why I have an almost unhealthy obsession with the trees in our yard. After decades of seeing little but coniferous trees (stately and beautiful), deciduous trees – especially those that change color – fill me with giddy and childish glee. God bless whoever planted these beauties in our yard.

Early-morning sunshine through one of the oaks and the honey locust.

This time of year, the sun seems to "glow" through the leaves more prominently, making even green leaves look magical.

The yard looks very picturesque this time of year.

By the end of October, the whole trees are fully ablaze.

The colors are so bright and rich, they almost seem artificial.

And then...

...they start to fall.

Leaves gather along fence lines.

Mr. Darcy starts to blend in.

This is the view from the garden. Half the oak has dropped its leaves, half is still in full foliage.

If it seems as if I'm a bit obsessed with our oak trees this time of year ... well, guilty as charged.

Here's Maggie, framed by some branches.

By mid-November, the trees were (mostly) bare, and it was time to get raking. 

This is usually a relaxed, multi-day process, depending on weather and my work schedule. Since not all the leaves had dropped from one of the oaks...

...I focused on the portion of the yard where the trees were mostly bare.

Even raking, the leaves are lovely.

I got about half the yard raked, then paused over Thanksgiving weekend. This gave the willow trees a chance to drop everything (whomp!) on the lawn, which meant essentially I had to start raking all over again. Rookie mistake.

Preponderance of willow leaves on the left and oak leaves on the right.

Although it was 39F on the day I finished up, I worked up enough heat to discard my jacket and scarf.

A final push to get everything done before dark.

The leaf container is pretty full, but that's okay. Everything will compress down and start decomposing over the winter, which means it can be used in the garden in the spring.

Here's Darcy, with a clean yard behind him.

I still have to rake the side yard, but that's a task for another day.