The Pumpkin Patch

The site of a mother carrying her child...who was wearing a swimsuit, goggles, and flippers...should have been my first clue to pack the children back into the car and turn around.

The massive amounts of school buses and daycare vans should have been my second clue.

Because fall was in the air this morning with crisp temperatures and bright sunshine and because my mom happens to be visiting casa de phillips, I decided today was THE day to visit the pumpkin patch.

Since we live in the 'burbs of a major metropolitan area, pumpkin patches are almost a dime a dozen around here. Many people throw around a few gourds, stack some hay bales, pull out a scarecrow, and declare themselves a pumpkin patch. We set out this morning for one patch whose popularity has soared in the past few years and is a mere 20 minute drive away. It happens to be right down the road from where Tobe and I first called home in our newlywed bliss six years ago (This particular pumpkin patch was just a regular pumpkin patch at that time...no bounce houses, no traffic jams, no neighbors competing with their own pumpkin patch next door.) Camera batteries were charged, car was loaded down with necessities (Baby Bjorn, fresh apple juice in the sippy cup, chic Mommy sunglasses), and off we headed to the magical land of pumpkins.

Apparently 200 other mommies did the same thing this morning and descended on the same magical land at the same time as the phillips' sedan.

Isaac loved the pumpkin patch. He loved the cut-outs (which I have never quite understood), the hay bale maze, and the large pretzel he got to each at an actual picnic table by an actual pot-belly pig. However he did not love Mommy attempting to take his picture, holding someone's hand as to prevent becoming lost in the sea of children, and being told that he could not hug every small child he encountered. Oh yeah, he also did not love having to share the large wooden firetruck which resulted in me having to break up a slight disagreement between him and another boy (whose mother acted like she never saw her child push my child first). There were quite a few tears at the ol patch today and very few smiles....one of those being when we had to prevent bees from attacking us while eating the pretzel. Apparently having your Nanny and your Mommy madly waving their arms at aggressive bees is hysterical.

Evelyn loved riding in the stroller. She did not love it when Mommy attempted to put her in a large vat of pumpkins to take a picture.

My lesson learned today is that my desire to have cute, adorable pictures of my children doing interesting things does not jive so well with my children's desire to have a good time. I need to chill out on the whole picture thing sometimes and just let Isaac be Isaac, rather than hoping Isaac will be a mini-model who happily sits at 15 different fall displays while I play photographer. Oh...and don't put my 5 month old in a vat of pumpkins.

Joy was restored as we packed back into the sedan and set off for casa de phillips after an hour and 1/2 of "fun" at the pumpkin patch. I made a mental note to self to not visit this particular pumpkin patch next year and be content with a smaller, scaled down version.

Despite the less than ideal time this morning, I did smile smugly at my reflection in the rear view mirror as we pulled out of the parking lot and say to myself, "At least I wasn't carrying a child in flippers."


(I did manage to take about 100 pictures today. I am guessing 5 of those turned out to be decent. Check back later for pictures.)

(FYI...Isaac calls my mom "Nanny", thus the reference to Nanny in the above post. I didn't want someone to think we had entered the high life here at casa de phillips and had hired us an actual nanny.)