Leaf Maze

At bedtime the big sisters often ask for a story about when I was a little girl. I try to make the stories seasonal, so in the fall I tell them about a leaf maze my mom once made...

...When I was a little girl we had a long driveway that we shared with our neighbors. In front of our house, the driveway was narrow, but back behind the house, it widened into a large circular space to accommodate the two garages at the end. A huge oak tree stood between the two garages. Most of the time we used this space to play basketball, hit tennis balls against the garage, roller skate (which once resulted in a broken arm, but that is another story), and bike ride. But one fall, my mom raked all the leaves that fell onto the driveway into a maze. My sister and I, and all the neighborhood kids, had a great fun in the maze. Every night I worried that my dad would ruin it when he backed out to go to work in the morning, or that the wind would blow it all away. But it lasted for days, matted down by rain and tidied with a rake from time to time...

I can't remember if my mom created a maze every year and the memories all melded into one great experience, or if it really was just one magical maze. Either way, Katherine and Clara love that story, and this year we finally have a yard, lots of leaves, and a functional rake (a non-functional rake, in case you are wondering, is a child-size rake that looks cute in the store but is inefficient and results in a terrible back ache).  

So this week, as our maple tree drops her lovely yellow leaves, we are raking up a maze.