Not this year.
This year, Mr. G wanted to do both pumpkin patch AND corn maze. There is an amazing corn maze about an hour from where we live. We've always been at night (so fun!) pre-kid, but we figured it'd be pretty awesome in the daytime with our girl, too. And the weather here is currently incredible, not at all like our usual wet Octobers! We had to seize the opportunity.
And bonus? They have a killer pumpkin patch on the same farm. If you are local you MUST check out Bob's Corn & Pumpkin Farm. Must!
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| This wasn't even half of it. |
Ruby took kind of a crappy nap, and didn't sleep at all on the way there. Which took forever, thanks to an accident on 405. So she was in a really weird/out of it/grumpy mood when we arrived. We parked, trucked it in past some farm animals (that she was interested in, but still way out of it), purchased our passes for the big maze, and while we waited for the tractor hayride to take us there, we discovered that the Snohomish County firefighters were there with some apparatus' for the kids to check out.
Mr. G was a firefighter back in the day, so you know we had to get our girl in that engine!
Mr. G was a firefighter back in the day, so you know we had to get our girl in that engine!
But she was still super weird and out of it! It was bizzare. Anyway, we decided to head over to the tractor pick-up area. All around us were amazing smells of roasting sweet corn and cider donuts. When Ruby saw the (enormous!) tractor, she perked up. This tractor was so huge, she could've fit inside the wheel. It might have been her favorite part. It pulled two huge haywagons to take us across the street to the maze, so we hopped aboard.
Still a total grumpapotamus, but she thought the straw was really cool. Once we arrived, you could either go to the pumpkin patch, or head into the 10 acre maze. Yes, 10 acres. That's where we went! We thought Ruby would enjoy running through the corn stalks. No. She wanted to be carried. But not really. She just wanted to grump? I was kind of worried. We got into the maze, and promptly got lost. In case you're wondering what we were dealing with, this is this year's maze:
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| via |
For reference, both the start and the finish are in the upper right corner (start is the opening at the bottom of that notch), and the large square at the bottom left is the halfway point. Oh, and the crop circles are areas for private firepit parties when you do the night maze (night maze is so awesome).
Anyway, we were lost, and we weren't even to the "BOB" part yet. And Ruby was grumping. We found a dead end, put her in the Beco, and decided to use the map (thank goodness we took a map, we almost didn't because we never have at night). Except when you're lost, it's almost impossible to orient yourself with the map. It wasn't until we stumbled into the O that we figured out where we were. We figured it wise to use the map with a cranky baby, but even with it, it was SO challenging! We got a little mixed up near the bee, but luckily I am pretty darn good with direction.
Thankfully, Ruby decided to fall asleep, and we all made it out alive a couple hours later.
We decided it was time to find the great pumpkin, so we headed out into the patch. Ruby was still pretty grouchy (what the heck, kid??), but once she saw the pumpkins, she asked to get down. It wasn't long before those big orange orbs turned her mood around.
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| Pumpkins everywhere! |
She tried to lift some huge pumpkins, and got really annoyed that she couldn't just pick them all up. Then she found the little one with the long curly stem, and it became her BFF. She kept pointing to it, and saying, "Wow!!!". It was super hard to walk out there over the dead vines (thank goodness it wasn't too muddy, since her rainboots arrived at our house while we were at the farm), so we decided to snag her little pumpkin and one of the cute white ones there, but head back across the road via tractor and get our big pumpkins by the barns, since we had all our stuff and they had another smaller patch over there.
We made a quick stop at the barn to see how our little lady measured up, and so that she could again show us how much she loved the curly-stemmed pumpkin, before walking over to the patch.
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| That face! |
She was freaking hilarious, trying to pick up all of the (huge) pumpkins. Mr. G decided to take the majority of our junk back to the car, so Ruby and I fooled around in the patch, taking tons of pictures of her cuteness. It was awesome to see her so excited about the pumpkins (especially after all the grumpies earlier!).
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| She really liked these greenish ones. I did too, I'm kinda sad I didn't take any home. |
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| "This one, Mama." |
Daddy came back and found us horsing around the barn again. Ruby would point to a pumpkin, then point to herself, which is how she usually lets us know she wants something. Haha! At one point, she even kissed a pumpkin!
We grabbed a pumpkin wheelbarrow and loaded up our little pumpkin for a ride through the patch to the other side, where we found the perfect mama & daddy pumpkins.
Back up at the barn, we found a cute little Ruby-sized pumpkin, too. Mr. G went in to pay, and Ruby and I watched kids swinging from a tire swing on a big old tree. Seriously, how awesome is this place?
After that, we had just enough time and energy to grab some hot apple cider donuts (my stomach just growled thinking about them). Ruby took one bite and couldn't believe what was in her mouth. After that, all we heard was, "Bite? Bite?". They were amazing.
We bumped along with our wheelbarrow way back out to the car (it was next to that black one driving in the picture above, oof), and loaded up for the trip home after what turned out to be an amazing day at the pumpkin patch. I already can't wait to take Ruby next year, and I feel like this was a preview of just how awesome holidays are going to be with a toddler.
And, hey! Since we weren't slackers this year, we still have time to take her to another pumpkin patch if we want. I'd love to take her back to the one we went to last year!
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