memories of fall colors.

Well, Hi again,
 I'm writing for Namowrimo and decided to use my blog to sort of try out ideas for my memory writers group.
I decided to use these pictures of Fall colors in Redmond and surrounding areas as a back drop for my memories of fall colors.
My first and best memory is of Fall in Farmington, CT.  My family moved from Austin, TX in the summer of 1957.  We moved into a garage apartment behind the large family home of the John Henry Frey, my mother's childhood home.  The house in front was still rented til next summer to a family with 3 teens and their mom.  The house is on a short dead end that has lots of big trees, maple and oaks.
This was the first time in my short life that I actually saw fall colors.  The seasons change in Texas but as far as I remember the trees just turned brown and fell off. 
In early September, the leaves of some trees were starting to change.  In the fields behind our house there were sumacs and the maples on our street that ed red. later elms and others added gold and yellow.  Out of my bedroom window was a large hill, I never learned the name of it but I think it is called Pinnacle.  As the fall proceeded the trees on the hill made a beautiful crazy quilt of fall colors, that i can still see in my minds eye to this day.

After two years-we returned to Texas.  It was November when we got to Boerne and the trees in my Grandma Ullrich's yard were already gone and the leaves on the Live Oak next door were still the glossy green that they would keep until spring.  So the years past with most of the trees either never loosing their leaves or losing them quickly after the first hard freeze in earky November.
Trees did change to different colors Mesquites shed tiny yellow leaves, while Mimosa's tiny brown leaves and larger brown seeds.  The one tree that does change dramatically is the Chinese Tallow, a non native predatory tree, that has either deep red or bright yellow leaves.

As an adult, I moved to Virginia where the leaves put on wonderful displays and the sweet gums made the fall air smells awesome.  We would burn  most of the leaves from our yard that were a mix of  red maple and Sweet gum.so the smell of the leaves is another memory that will always be with me.  After our tour of Duty in Iceland in 1983we returned Texas and lived there until 2016.
In 2016, I moved to Washington State to live with my Daughter's family.  I arrived in July and because I had never been to Washington in the fall I was pleasantly surprised at the display of colors come late September and early October.  This is my third fall here and I still can't get over the marvelous display that occurs every Fall.  So far none have been the same and I expect that they will continue to be different every year dependent on the conditions of the seasons that preceed it.