Mama Kat Thursday: Fall Leaves!

Today's blog prompt is:

Write a post inspired by the word: "leaves"



Pretty maple in Terre Haute, IN

I grew up in the rolling hill country of southern Indiana, surrounded by deep woods. We had quite a variety: beech, hickory, sassafras, ironwood, ash, tulip, red maple, silver maple, dogwood, red bud, red oak, white oak, pin oak, swamp oak and sycamores that all turned rich colors of yellow, orange or russet come fall.
Autumn was a gorgeous time, but it isn't just beautiful color I remember. Thinking of leaves also reminds me of the hours of fun my sisters and I had playing with them!
Of course, jumping in a leaf pile is customary. We had an abundance of oaks near the house that dropped ponderous  quantities of large leaves, so it was easy to rake up a big, fluffy pile for jumping. 
Another thing we'd do is create "playhouses" with leaves. We'd rake them into rows forming walls, rooms and doorways, then we'd play dolls in our "leaf houses."

When a bit older, we invented "leaf-races." We'd hike down to the creek, then walk to a starting point far up stream. We would each carefully select a dry autumn leaf curved enough to be a good "racing boat." Also a stick to use as a guide, then we'd launch our leaf-boats onto the stream and follow them, using the sticks to keep them from getting hung up on rocks or eddies.
First leaf to reach the finish line, won.

Such are my fond memories of autumn leaves.