Pumpkin Picking

Over the past six years we haven't created much of a tradition about where we buy pumpkins- we have picked them up at the grocery store, farm stands on the way home from Granddad's, pumpkin patches- all over the place, but we do have a tradition of buying pumpkins. 

Pumpkins are one of the more labor intensive traditions I have forced on my family- mostly labor intensive for me because I do 90% of the pumpkin carving and gutting (except Cordelia actually carved her own this year!). However, I really love the non permanent art that is pumpkin carving, and I find pumpkins just as fun to carve as it is to watch the squirrels eat them.  

This year my sister Shauna took the girls and I out to Larriland Farm to pick our pumpkins, and while we were there we picked apples and broccoli. 

Of course I took this opportunity to dress the girls in the matching shirts my mom gave them! 

Adeline enjoyed crawling in the dirt, putting everything in her mouth, and being dubious about the pumpkin cart.

Cordelia enjoyed picking everyone else's pumpkins, huffing,  

squishing her sister, 

and playing with the slugs. She has always really enjoyed slugs. 

Adeline was perplexed by the fact that we wanted her to take the apples off the trees when she could just as easily pick the apples up off the ground (this is a tree apple not a rotten ground apple, for the record).

Cordelia is concerned that there will be more pictures of Adeline than there are of her- so she really likes to jump in Adeline's pictures. 

By the end of our trip both girls were perplexed that we didn't just pick apples out of these buckets! Fruit and veggie picking is hard work! 

Does your family have a pumpkin picking tradition? If you are curious about how we carved our pumpkins (this year and in years past) check out the hashtag #tocknellpumpkins on instagram. 

A once in a lifetime event

One of the things that used to frustrate me about blogging was the delay- It seemed that all of these wonderful mommy bloggers had their posts up the day something happened! However, I think I have come to terms with the fact that as long as my pictures and stories make it to the blog eventually, I'm ok with it. This blog post I actually almost had finished and my computer restarted and deleted it! So to start again- This picture above, is not a cool filter, it is, in fact, the humidity of the south. 

As you might have heard, the United States had the opportunity to witness a once in a lifetime event- a total solar eclipse, with the path of totality stretching from Lincoln Beach, Oregon to Charleston, South Carolina. Originally I figured we wouldn't make a big deal out of it we thought about it because my best friend lives a long the path of totality, but I honestly couldn't fathom what witnessing an eclipse would be like (having never seen one before) and I didn't see much of a reason to spend hours in the car driving to a spot in the path of totality to see something I couldn't fathom. 

Except, as I was sitting through my Uncle's Funeral, one of his friends said something that resonated with me. He said "go see your friends, spend time with people, because often times a lifetime isn't as long as you think". Hearing that changed my mind in an instant, and I walked out of there planning car activities for the girls and making a grocery list of enough car snacks to keep us fed in case the drive took us four times as long as it should have. 

It was a very, very long car ride, but we made it, and I was so happy to visit with my best friend, and to give our girls the opportunity to play together. Through a series of events, some sad, and some lucky, we have gotten to see each other an incredible about of time this year despite living with several states between us.   

On Eclipse day we sat out in the drizzle with our fancy special glasses and were able to watch in awe as the moon started to cover the sun, but we were slightly disappointed to loose totality to clouds. 

That disappointment didn't overshadow just how cool it was to watch the world go dark as night in the middle of the day, and to hear the night bugs come out, and watch the birds fly home, or how much fun it was to be with friends. 

Although it did make this little girl a tad cranky. 

I'm hoping Cordelia remembers this trip, but I figured at least the girls will be able to look at these pictures and be told about the one time they were driven ten hours to sit in the front yard of Mama's best friend's house wearing coordinating outfits! 

It was fun to make a mini eclipse collection, much more fun than making them all the same dress I think. I used some beautiful Rae Ritchie moon phases fabric that I have been hording in my stash, along with a blue and grey galaxy print fabric, and a silver polka dot print from Joanns. The white trim on the little girl's outfits is vintage, and Cordelia's is ball fringe- it made me think of moons!  

I am grateful that this sweet family could host us! 

And I am grateful that my wiggly bunch survived the car trip! 

A Sunny Day in December

We live in a wonderful community. A community full of friendly neighbors, lots of kids, and a great collection of parks. We have a pretty small yard so it's really fun to be able to walk to so many parks- it keeps life interesting! 

The park closest to our house used to be tiny and old and dirty. However, after some hard work from some neighbors, the city revamped it- replacing the equipment and redoing the entire layout. We spent a lot of time walking to the park just to sit and watch the workers build, and now each trip to the finished park is an adventure. Everything is just soo new and fresh! 

There are two big pieces of playground equipment- one for children ages 2-5 and one for 5 and up. There are swings, mushroom stools, spinning leafs, climbing tree posts, a dragon fly seesaw, and the best part - lots of slides. 

Pumpkin Picking

To continue my October in November posts, I want to share some pictures of our pumpkin patch trip! In years past we have bought our pumpkins from side of the road farm stands and from nursery's so this was our first trip to an actual pumpkin patch. Brendon's Dad and Step Mother invited us out to one right near their house and we (Cordelia especially) had a blast! 

Summers Farm was a fun place filled with mazes, animals, slides, corn pits- lots of things to climb and touch and do.   

Brendon has a four photo limit for smiling- or at least that's what it seems because he really did enjoy himself, I swear. 

Cordelia especially loved this little short maze- I'm not entirely sure she understood how the maze worked, I think you were only supposed to make right turns but she loved running in circles inside of it. 

And in her mind you never can go wrong with a pony ride.

Or a bumpy dusty barrel ride! Looking at these pictures Cordelia went off on a whole speech about how much fun it was and how much she wants to do it again! 

Grandma Sherry walked Cordelia all the way out to the far ends of the pumpkin patch to find her a pumpkin her size which I think meant a lot to Cordelia. 

We made out like bandits- they had a great selection of pumpkins- we even got our first white pumpkin which was really cool (I carved him up to look like Jack Skellington).

It was a good trip, with lots of memories made, and I think we are fully converted pumpkin patch people!