Monday 29 October 2012

Pumpkin Patch Fiasco

Every year back when we lived in Victoria we would go to a local farm that had U-pick pumpkins and a corn maze, animal farm, hayride..the works.  It was a fun, fall family event.  I always looked forward to doing this every year.  So when we moved here to Medicine Hat, I was very sad when there were no local farms that had U-pick pumpkins.

Last year I found out that just a mere 2 hours away in Lethbridge, there was a farm that had U-pick pumpkins and all the other fun stuff that goes with it!  So last Sunday we decided ( and by "we" I mean me) to drive to this farm so that once again we could participate in a fun, fall family event.

From the get go Olivia was NOT on board with driving for 2 hours just to get some pumpkins.  She begrudgingly got in the car.  We have a DVD player in the car and the girls were happily watching Dora, so Olivia seemed fairly happy.

Movies + 2 hour car ride= quiet, fairly happy kidlets.

But then, the DVD player stopped working.

Crap.

The crying and fussing began.....just from Olivia.

"Turn around!  I want to go home!  Let's just buy some pumpkins from the store.  This is LAME!"

"Once we are there, you will have fun!  It's an adventure!"  I kept saying.

We got lost.  Yeah, I am not the best at navigating...

But the good news is that the DVD player started working! Yay!  Olivia still kept insisting that we just buy the pumpkins from the store.

Mickey figured out where to go.  We were driving out in the middle of farm country, on gravel roads.  Then Mickey said,  "Do you know their hours of operation?".

Hmmmmmm, nope.  Never even thought to check.

So I checked.  My heart sank.  They weren't open on Sunday's.

Double crap!!

After spending 2 hours (if not a tad more) in the car, Olivia fussing and crying and complaining for a good portion of the way, we now had to break it to the girls that the farm was closed.

Seriously, who closes on a Sunday during the Halloween Season????

Olivia was, as expected, the one who was the most upset.  At some point in the trip Sophie had started tuning out Olivia's outbursts so she seemed OK about the fact we were not going to get any pumpkins, or pet any animals.  And Stella, well poor child was exhausted and had fallen asleep.

This family day was definitely not turning out like I had envisioned.! No happy children petting goats, crawling in the mud and picking pumpkins.  Sigh.


To make it up to our girls we took them to McDonalds for lunch....and Toys R Us to buy a toy.  All three girls loved burning off some pent up energy at the play place in McDonalds.  Sophie and Livi enjoyed climbing up to the top and down the slide. Whilst Stella enjoyed going down the little kid slide, backwards face down while licking it.  But then a birthday party arrived and the play pace got really busy! Sophie started crying and was most upset as some "mean boys" kept knocking her over.  That was our cue to leave so we headed over to Toys R Us.

Man, that place is crazy!!  Soooooo many toys, so little time.

It took awhile but the girls finally picked out a toy.  Yeesh, it would have cost us less to go pick some pumpkins.

Tummies were full, kidlets were happy with their new toys, so off we headed back to "the Hat". We stopped for the train.  It was a very looooonnnnggg train. Then the train just stopped moving.

SOB!

We sat there for about 10 minutes or so.  I was starting to panic! I had no snacks left!  I only had one diaper! What if we are stuck here all night?

We kept seeing cars driving up on the side of the road and through the parking lot of the building that was beside the road.  We were desperate! The natives were getting restless! So we followed the other cars, jumped the curb and drove through the parking lot.

We did it! We were free! We took a few side roads and found the highway again.

Needless to say, we made it home.

Then just yesterday, we went to Superstore and bought pumpkins.....just like Olivia has been begging us to do all along.

Next year, we will try fall, family fun again.

Next year.


















There are positives to missing out on pumpkins...getting to ride a bike in the store!

Lil poser on our Toys R Us adventure.
Poor kid, passed out after a long car ride to nowhere.

The start of our adventure to a "closed" pumpkin patch.  Notice how Olivia does not look overly enthused.

Stella rockin in the BMW at Toys R Us.

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