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The passing of time is often compared to the seasons — spring being the time of rebirth and awakening, summer that of full bloom. In autumn, like middle-age, things are changing,  vital yet, but with hints to show we're clearly moving towards something alternately quiet and fading, raging and dynamic. For now, fall is on its way in the northern hemisphere. When one thinks of things brimming with life, that season doesn't typically come to mind.  Streets are quiet as the children have returned to school and the day's darkness descends earlier. Robins no longer flit across the lawn in search of food, having begun their exodus to warmer climates.  There is a definite stillness to things that isn't there in summer. That doesn't mean, however, that everything is static. There is no more action to be found any time of year than in a Canadian hockey rink as players lace up and fans return for the first season's play.  On television and in the field football is a

With three new additions to our clan this year, the time has come, albeit a little sooner than we had planned, for updating the  family photos.  Chronicling our group's growth, in size and numbers, has typically been done on a three-year cycle. We've bumped it up a year, however, so that I can see those precious new faces among the rest of the ones I love in the portraits on the wall. What won't be changing is the time of year we have chosen for our pictures. Since our babies were babies, our family photo sessions have happened in the autumn, when nature couldn't be more beautiful.  A riot of crimson, orange, gold and yellow, the fall foliage provides a perfect backdrop as well as inspiration for the colour scheme in co-ordinating fashion.  Though you do take a chance with the weather; roughly eight photo sessions, and only one in sunshine;  that can happen in any season. Besides, in autumn you miss the bugs and muggy humidity that comes with summer and the stil

Like me, you might not enjoy seeing the end of summer, the shortening days, the changing leaves. But as we look to these harbingers of autumn we can also be reminded that that season too comes with its blessings and highs. While we tend to think of the dog days as a time to relax and rejuvenate, to travel and tour, to party and play, autumn, particularly in its early weeks is a bevy of activity and celebration. The fall harvest gives us occasion to  enjoy the bounty. Communities and visitors come together for the annual fairs,  events to show off one's green thumb or agricultural know-how.  There are holidays to enjoy too. The season is the time of Thanksgiving where we count our blessings, where food and family are the highlights. The end of October is most anticipated by youngsters and the young at heart as out come the ghosts, goblins and assorted other strange creatures for Halloween. As we gather our stores for the upcoming winter, we enjoy the beauty that autumn provi

It was strange waking up this morning and thinking about the children going back to school. It wasn't just that I don't have any little ones of my own any more, for whom I would have  spent the past few weeks buying new clothes and supplies, that made this  a bit surreal. It was also the fact that this past weekend might very well have been the hottest and muggiest we've experienced all summer.  It was  that primarily I think that made the fact of its impending end seem a little off.  While the possibility of many warm days remains, while the equinox is still weeks away, once the kids head back to school for another year, it's like Mother Nature knows. You can feel the breath of autumn on each late summer breeze. As an end of September birthday celebrant, I loved the fall as a child. Now, though, I'm a little blue when I feel it's on its way.  I mourn the loss of a burning sun, of long days, of beaches and campfires, hammocks and patios. And yet, autum