September 1, 2026
The Season I’m In
Dear Friend,
September has always felt a little like a beginning to me, just not in the way January does. There are no resolutions or expectations that everything needs to change. The mornings simply begin to feel different, the evenings come a little sooner, and the light through the windows starts to soften even while the afternoons still hold on to summer.
Maybe that’s why I’ve been thinking about the season I’m in—not only the one happening outside my window, but the one happening in my life.
There are changes ahead for our family. My youngest son has decided to join the Army. I’m incredibly proud of him, but there’s something about knowing my youngest is preparing to leave that makes me want to slow everything down just a little. One son is already serving, and somehow, we’ve reached the point where the youngest is beginning a life of his own, too.
Motherhood is funny that way. You spend years caught up in school mornings, practices, dinners, laundry and all the ordinary things that fill a home, and then one day you realize those years weren’t ordinary at all. They were a season, and you were living right in the middle of it.
So this fall, I want to pay attention.
I want to start an autumn book, probably The Autumn Leaf Bookshop by Kay Michaels, and read it simply because curling up with a fall story sounds good. I want to keep walking, something I came to love even more this summer, and give myself that time to think, pray and let new ideas find me.
I want to notice the small things I usually walk past without much thought. The first leaves changing, cooler mornings, the way the afternoon light falls differently across the house. I may even collect a few large maple leaves and press them between the pages of a book, just because I haven’t done something like that in years.
And sometime soon, I’m going to plant mums in the flowerbed outside my writing window. I like knowing they’ll be right there when I look up from my desk, a small reminder that the season is changing right outside.
I also want to make more room for writing this fall. There are chapters I’ve been wanting to return to and stories that have been sitting quietly in the back of my mind, waiting for me to give them a little more time. There’s something about this time of year that makes me want to settle in at my desk, open the window when the weather allows, and see where those pages take me.
Maybe that’s what this season is really about for me.
Not wishing for something different, but appreciating what is already here.
“This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”
— Psalm 118:24
There is so much in my life today that I once hoped and prayed for, and I don’t want to become so focused on what comes next that I forget to enjoy it while it’s here.
This fall, I want to plant the mums, read the book, take the walks, press a few leaves between the pages and spend time with the people I love. I want to look around at the life God has given me and be thankful for this day, this season and this version of home while I’m still right here in the middle of it.
From my writing desk,
Shelley
Before you go, I made something for you to carry into the season with you. Autumn Reflections is a quiet collection of prompts, gratitude, prayer, and Scripture created to help you slow down and notice the season you’re in.
Print a copy, make a cup of something warm, and come back to it whenever you need a few quiet moments this fall.
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