Our first sign that autumn has really arrived is the local pumpkin patch, already selling all shapes and sizes of those beautiful orange signs of pre-Halloween.

On a trip to England I asked My Beloved Brit when the leaves change in England in the fall.  We were walking through the village of Grasmere in the beautiful Lake District in late summer, and lo and behold I spied a few leaves already changing. I could smell the gingerbread in the air, as the first few leaves drifted down.

He explained to me that England didn’t really have those fall colors that I had grown up seeing in New York.  In England, one day they turn, and the next they are on the ground.  Or so it seemed to him.

I still was able to find enough color for reference for “Autumn Branches”, and every fall when I see the leaves just start to change I think of that afternoon in Grasmere, walking down the lane.

"Autumn Branches", oil painting, the artist's collection