Pumpkins & Mums

Oh how I love fall! I usually end up decorating for Fall starting the 1st of October but with our unusually cool mornings this past week I have gotten the "bug" to start early.

So today I ventured out on a mission to find hardy mums (with plans to plant them for next year), pumpkins and Halloween/fall decor. I made my way to Hobby Lobby where I picked out some really cute yard art, Bed Bath & Beyond to purchase the super cute Halloween canisters I saw in an ad, then I stopped at a local farmers market booth where they had TONS of pumpkins so I got 2 big ones and 2 little ones - hopefully they last until Halloween so I can carve them! Last stop was at Ace Hardware to pick out some mums. Surprisingly, they always have a great variety of flowers/shrubs/bushes to pick from every spring and for fall flowers they didn't disappoint. And another bonus is that they were perennial mums AND on sale - SCORE :)

Once home, I set everything out in front and this feeling of excitement came over me & I got goosebumps - I don't know if it was the fact that I LOVE LOVE LOVE fall or the fact that out of the corner of my eye I see this little guy staring at me as I was setting out my flowers:

Then he was on the move:

Now I am fine with snakes as long as they are still or coiled up. When they start slithering I start to panic. I quick ran to get the camera because I wanted to get a picture of it so I could look it up online to see what kind of snake it was and if we should be concerned about it being poisonous. Turns out, that what you see in this picture is a baby Western Fox Snake. I know that it is a baby because it was only 12 inches long and an adult will get to be 50 inches long! Whoa - that is 4+ feet!

This is concerning because a) where there is a baby there is a mom & dad and b) there are probably brothers & sisters and c) we found several snake holes in our flower bed that lead under the front steps so there is probably a family of snakes under there.

After much discussion of what to do with this snake (as Shane had the shovel in his hand) we decided to let the little guy live. Turns out that these snakes are non-venomous and they prey on rodents, mice and bugs so they are actually good to have around your house - especially since we have the occasional mouse that likes to hang out by our grill! I guess as long as I don't see them or see them moving I am fine with that.

So, after all that excitement, I finished arranging the flowers & pumpkins in the front of the house. The mums are just starting to bloom and look so pretty! This is what I have done so far - it's not much but it's a start:

I am heading out today to run some errands so we will see what else I can find! Next up on the agenda is decorating inside the house. Light up the fall Yankee Candle and let the decorating festivites begin :)