I was four years old and had recently started school when I fell in love for the first time. It was a corresponded and colorful love, if I may use this adjective, and it has lasted until the present. The flame is still there, because, as the English say, “true love lasts a lifetime”.
My first love was autumn. And year after year it shows me its beauty in all facets.
In the school where I was going and where my admiration for this season arose, I was educated according to the Montessori method. In the first two courses, from four to six years, everything revolved around the development of children’s senses; therefore, when autumn came and the trees began to change color, the rain left a special smell in the air and the strong wind sometimes covered your ears, our duties consisted in bringing to class all the treasures that nature gave us during these months. In class the teacher prepared a table and there our collection was exhibited, called “herfsttafel” (autumn table). We had dried leaves of all colors, pineapples, acorns, beech fruits, hazelnuts, branches, chestnuts, moss, etc. Accompanied by figures of gnomes and artificial mushrooms. The leaves and fruits were found on the street or in the neighborhood park, but in order to take the most beautiful chestnuts to class, my parents took me by bike to one of the largest cemeteries in the city, because there we found the best chestnuts. For me that habit was the most normal in the world, but seeing it now, I suppose that this habit, among other things, has helped me to have such a natural relationship with death and the graveyards.
When I was older I also began to love the candles that illuminated us on the rainiest and darkest days of the season. As I spent more time at home, I took the DIY materials out of the closet again and started doing handicrafts with pineapples and leaves, among which I could not miss the development of a herbarium.
Autumn gives us so many beautiful things and, in particular, gives a lot of play for the decoration of weddings. Here are some examples, but the possibilities are endless.
