Autumn Leaves

the storm blowing in

The leaves have been slow to change this autumn in Eastern NC. Finally the maples and dogwoods, the first to turn, are a bright red. The oaks are still green, but a few other variety of trees are showing hints of yellow.

My son and I went out yesterday before a big storm rolled in to collect leaves to draw in our journals. We found some lovely reds from the crape myrtles and the neighbor's maple tree. Our little magnolia tree dropped a nice green leaf, and we collected two more from my rose of sharon and redbud trees.

This is my journal page. I used colored pencil to sketch the leaves and a rubber stamp of a splatter pattern to make the mottled brown on the maple and yellow rose of sharon leaves. I'll probably paint around them and embellish the page later.

Here is my five-year old's journal page. I think he did pretty good! Last year he was capable only of doing leaf rubbings. My how quickly they progress in just a year!

And finally, I leave you with this...

Our post-storm view! It was actually a double rainbow but the second one didn't show up very well in this shot.