Our circus headed off on an adventure this morning to see some beautiful countryside and to find ourselves some pumpkins. Mama had done a bit of research and discovered what promised to be an authentic pumpkin patch. It was in Half Moon Bay, home of the Art and Pumpkin Festival and about a dozen other pumpkin patches. (The festival is this weekend and the horrific traffic it creates prompted our weekday journey.) At this particular pumpkin patch, though, you could actually cut the pumpkins off the vine! It was supposed to be low-key, less-crowded, and affordable. Oh, and it had ocean views. I was sold. Unfortunately, the directions I'd printed from the internet took us not to some out of the way pumpkin field, but to a shopping center complete with a Starbucks. Whoops.
We drove around a bit, hoping we'd stumble onto the pumpkin patch, but we had no immediate luck, and our passengers were beginning to protest our seemingly endless drive around the countryside. We chose instead one of the bigger, better-known pumpkin patches. And while it wasn't necessarily the "authentic" experience we'd been hoping for, the girls absolutely loved it. It was plenty busy for a Thursday morning, so I really can't imagine how crazy it would've been over the weekend.
To begin with, there were goats. If you've learned nothing else about Kathleen over the past few months or so, it's that the child loves to feed some goats. At first, she was surprised to see the animals...
Surprise quickly gave way to glee.
In addition to a bouncy house, a "railroad," and pony rides (all of which we somehow avoided), the pumpkin patch had rocking horses a various spots around the farm. The girls both loved them. (Actually, I think the girls' love for the rocking horses had a lot to do with why we were able to skip the other, non-free aspects of the extravaganza.)
Eventually, though, we got down to business. Everyone helped choose pumpkins.
Madeline scrutinized the pumpkins most carefully.
Surprise quickly gave way to glee.
In addition to a bouncy house, a "railroad," and pony rides (all of which we somehow avoided), the pumpkin patch had rocking horses a various spots around the farm. The girls both loved them. (Actually, I think the girls' love for the rocking horses had a lot to do with why we were able to skip the other, non-free aspects of the extravaganza.)
Eventually, though, we got down to business. Everyone helped choose pumpkins.
Madeline scrutinized the pumpkins most carefully.
Kathleen alternated between examining the pumpkins and dancing to the old-time country music. After lots of looking and a fair amount of dancing, we settled on one enormous pumpkin, one large pumpkin, two small pumpkins, and one pumpkin/gourd hybrid, which we loaded into the wheelbarrow. It was just a little too heavy for Kathleen to push.
Thankfully Daddy was around to haul the pumpkins out to the car. When we'd loaded the pumpkins and the girls, we headed back toward home. We dropped Daddy off at school and made it home in time for naps. (For the girls and for Mama, too!) And aside from not actually "picking" our pumpkins, it couldn't have worked out better.
What a pumpkin adventure!
4 comments:
That's where we went last year. The pony rides were actually pretty fun for Finley. I am told that on weekdays you are allowed to go around the ring next to your child. (That's not the case on weekends. Poor Declan was so excited to go on the pony and then burst into tears the minute the pony started around the ring. Fortunately, they took him off and handed him back to me quickly.)
Now you know we have nothing that looks like that here! How FUN! If I ever get to the big rock my list of Things I Will Do On The Big Rock is getting longer and longer.
I love Kathleen's surprised face. It gave me a good chuckle. :) The pic with Jim and the girls is great too. Have fun carving those pumpkins.
Looks like so much fun! Aaghhh! Why didn't we pick the same school?!
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