My favorite season of the year is finally here! I just love the smell in the air when fall begins, the beautiful colors, and of course, football! One of the Sunrise producers did some great research on fun things to do during the fall for our show yesterday and I wanted to share those things, plus a few others so you can all enjoy the nice weather too.

One activity that's always a favorite this time of year is corn mazes. I did a story on one at the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks in Fayetteville a couple of years ago and it was really neat. I'm not sure if they are doing the maze this year, but they are having their grand opening celebration next week. It's always a beautiful place to go no matter what time of year. There is a pretty cool corn maze in Broken Arrow, OK. You can check out that maze and many others at Corn Mazes America website.

Another favorite for the entire family -- the Wild Things Farm in Pocola. In some video we showed yesterday on Sunrise, kids were picking and decorating pumpkins and having fun with the 'corn cob sling'. To learn more, visit Wild Things Farm.

Another fall favorite of mine... hitting the road. The fall foliage is beautiful in the Ozarks. The Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism releases weekly reports this time of year on where the colors are peaking in the state. Just visit the Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism website.
If you like to be more active then why not head to a state park or any park really, and take a hike. This past weekend we hiked a few trails at Devil's Den State Park. There are some really neat caves you can explore there as well. You can find a trail near you by visiting this site. You can pick out trails based on skill level and length on this site as well.

Happy fall to you all... enjoy it! If you have a special way to celebrate or enjoy fall or know of other fun fall activities, please share them.

Earlier hours and commuting don't make for a good blogger! I'm sorry it's been so long since my last post, but there is now a light at the end of the tunnel for when the commute to Fort Smith will be over and I'll be able to sleep in an extra hour... at least it will feel like sleeping in until I get used to my 'old' hours again. Both newsrooms in the River Valley and Northwest Arkansas have been undergoing major renovations and upgrades over the past few weeks and we will finally be able to show it all to you next week! Starting Wednesday, October 10th we'll be broadcasting out of our new state-of-the-art studio in Rogers and from our beautiful new set in Fort Smith. I was able to see the new set and offices just last week and they are fantastic... I hope you will all like the new look as well.

As far as the commute goes, I really respect everyone who commutes a long distance to work everyday. When we lived in Missouri, my husband had an hour drive to and from work on narrow two lane roads. I just didn't appreciate what he was sacrificing (family time and sleep) to work so far away so I could have the job I really enjoyed. So my hat is off to all commuters!

Now that fall is finally here, I'm sure you are all looking for something fun to do outside. Tomorrow I'll tell you about some fun places all around the area that are great excuses to get out of the house. Crystal, a sunrise producer, did some wonderful research and found some really neat options, so a big thanks to Crystal for my next blog idea!

Our trip to Withrow Springs State Park (near Huntsville) was a very quiet and pleasant experience. You can definitely tell summer is coming to an end and school is back in session because there was only one other couple camping there that weekend. It was kind of nice to have the entire place to yourself. It rained most of Friday night and Saturday morning, so we weren't able to do any hiking due to the trail being really muddy. We did visit the pool, which Jackson loved. The park actually has a great pool with some fun features, including a double slide. Since no one else was there, I made sure to return to my childhood and slide down a few times. I had forgotten how much fun that was! There's also a nice pavilion and park area. We didn't get to go to the park because there was a birthday party going on when we drove by, so we decided to keep going... all the way to Eureka Springs! Eureka is only about 25 minutes away, so we decided to go there for lunch. We did take the dogs this time, which was interesting because they love to chase squirrels and anything else in the wild. I guess it was a good thing we were pretty much there alone, because on all of our walks, they would howl and tree animals. Even with the rain, we had a great time and would recommend this park for a laid back time. There are only a couple of trails, so there's not too much to do at the actual park, but Huntsville and Eureka are close!