Pumpkin hunting!

We're not gonna lie — this morning started out pretty rough. Miss Carmela June is sick and also getting some more molars, it appears, and Mom and Dad had a terribly frustrating and emotionally exhausting morning dealing with inappropriate toddler behavior, successive meltdowns, melodramatic collapses, ear-splitting shrieks, and other good times. All that said, it was sunny today — beautiful, actually — and as it was probably the last sunny day until next July, we decided to take our chances and head up to the pumpkin patch for some pumpkin hunting. Boy are we glad we did. Everyone got out into the sunshine and Mom thinks it was just the break we needed. Mom packed up some tuna fish and crackers, and we bought some corn on the cob and a hot baked potato with sour cream and chives while we were there — with Dad's apple cider, we had a great outdoor lunch. We visited the petting zoo and saw some chicks, a few hens, a rooster or two, some peacocks, some goats, and a sheep — one of the goats ate some snack pellets out of the hands of some people next to us, so Ela got to check that out up close. We skipped the giant scary corn maze, but Carmela was wild about the toddler maze. It was just her size, and she loved running around the corners and bumping into the other kids coming the other direction. We liked it so much we went into it twice! As Miss Carmela was bored with walking, and because pumpkins are too big to throw over the side, she got to ride in the wheelbarrow as we ventured into the pumpkin patch. It was swarming with people, but it was fun, and we got three pumpkins, one for Mom, one for Dad, and a little one for Carmela. Daddy cleaned them off in a big bucket, and now they're sitting by our fireplace. Dad was only a little sad that we didn't stand in line for the pumpkin cannon, but little girls only have so much patience for lines, and there were a couple of them today. Maybe next year.

In the end, visiting the pumpkin patch seemed to be kind of a turning point. Ela was still a little bit fussy, but seemed much better, and we actually had a pretty fun afternoon and evening. And Mom guesses everyone's entitled to a rotten morning now and then.