Last year Mom devised an ingenious idea. If we did six weeks of school without stopping, then the seventh week would be our week off. With such a magnificent idea as this, we carried it with us into this year. As impossible as it sounds, we have already been doing school for six weeks and this is our seventh. When Mom created her idea, she said that our week off would be devoted to crafts and things of that nature. Over the course of this week, we have made board games out of poster board and markers, made forts out of logs outside, and recovered pillows. Today, however, was different. After a couple of hours of building forts, we gathered together several backpacks and filled them high with water bottles and a picnic lunch. Today the destination for our glorious picnicking was Paris Mountain state park.

As we walked by the very familiar sight of the man-made waterfall, Eli had to stop for a moment to take a long look at the churning water in front of him.

Along the way we encountered an abnormally large squirrel and a turtle whose family and gender were unknown.

It seems that this little leaf is changing colors faster than its companions. Fall walks through Paris Mountain couldn't be prettier. I can't wait till all of the leaves start changing.