Fall in Alaska

Fall in Alaska is special.  It just occurs early and is short-lived.  Today we took full advantage as it is possible most leaves will be gone by next weekend.  We started with a hike at Eagle River Nature Center with the Knee-Hi Naturalist where Liam learned about all type of birds.  We spotted a raven, a spruce quail, a woodpecker, and a chickadee.  Most of the salmon have left Eagle River, but we did see one silver salmon still hanging around.  The grizzlies we spotted last week (yikes!) were nowhere to be seen.

Ben resting during our hike:

After the hike, we headed up to Palmer to the Fall Festival.  I blogged about last year's trip here.  Here are some pictures of the boys playing in the leaf pile this year:

It was crowded and Ben clung to me for dear life much of the time, though he did get down to play occasionally.  Liam rode a cute tractor/wagon ride, but Ben refused to let go of me.  After Liam pulled away, Ben wailed, though it might be because he didn't want Liam leaving, not that Ben wanted to ride.  Liam loved the ride:

Liam has been doing so awesome that it can be easy to overlook his difficulty handling some social situations.  Today was too much for him and eventually he resorted to this:

Right after this, he asked to leave and told me it was too loud.  His desire to leave was sudden that we hadn't yet gotten pumpkins (we save it to last so we don't have to haul them over the farm).  Liam was VERY clear that he was not up for picking pumpkins this year.  2011 is the very year since he was born that we haven't picked a pumpkin, but we won't do it at the expense of Liam's happiness.  The festival is only 1 afternoon, so that was our one and only chance.  I am just happy that he can express himself instead of resorting to a meltdown.  We have come so very far.