PumpkinFest '09

Saturday was dedicated to the celebration of the humble pumpkin at the PumpkinFest! The Country Market in Zionsville has this awesome festival each weekend in October with all sorts of Autumn related activities. Here was some of the fun we had:

Typical family photo. Alex won't look at the camera, and neither will Andrew this time. Nick and I just smile and hope for the best. Sigh. Will we ever get a nice family picture?! AHGAH!














They had pony rides, which thrilled Andrew who fancies himself a cowboy...

What is fall without a good ol' hayride?! Me and Alex cozied down in the soft hay and enjoyed the ride around the farm...

OK, here was my favorite part of the PumpkinFest...warm, fresh, homemade DONUTS. To quote Homer Simpson, "MMmmm...DONUTS." Seriously these were so good I went back for seconds. Here are the boys enjoying the warm little pieces of happiness...

They even have this adorable old timey fiddle music playing, which of course made the kids dance. Here would probably be a good place to explain Andrew's coat situation. We had been working in the yard all day and he had gotten his coat filthy. So I popped it in the washer and dryer over his nap so it would be ready to go when we headed out to the farm. As we headed out the door, I grabbed Alex and Alex's coat and Nick grabbed Andrew and I THOUGHT Andrew's coat. We drove all the way to the farm and realized that we forgot his coat but didn't want to waste and hour driving home and back. Still, it was about 50 degrees, which isn't something for a little guy to be running around in coat-less so we improvised by cinching up Nick's pullover around Andrew and rolling the sleeves up A LOT. So he looks kind of like he has a costume on but really it's just a man's jacket on a child. Nice parenting, I thought. Anyway, here is some video of the boys dancing...

They have these cute cut-outs where you can poke your face through. Which would have been adorable if I could have gotten everyone to LOOK AT THE CAMERA. AGHAGH, again!

The boy's selection from the pumpkin patch...

Instead of a sand box they have a corn box full of dried corn kernels to play with instead of sand...

They have all these really cute little places to take pictures. If only I had a photogenic family! Curses! This one didn't turn out TOO bad, though. You've got to love little boys on tractors...

And I've saved the best for last! The boy's (Nick included) favorite part of the whole thing was this hay slide they had constructed on the side of a hill on the farm. It was really just a long peice of hard plastic that had hay bales on either side but the kids loved it! Here is me going down with both boys...

And here is some video of Nick and the boys going down together. Too fun!