Pumpkin Picking '14

Where did Fall go?  One second the leaves are changing and the next it's snowing and in the 30s!  I'm not a winter-hater by any means, but I Fall is by far my favorite season and it also seems to be the shortest one!  But let's talk about traditions, which seems appropriate since it's nearly Thanksgiving and Christmas will be here before you know it.

By far my favorite Fall tradition is pumpkin picking!  It started when my best friend, Amanda, and I were roommates in college.  We'd pack some bacon sandwiches and spend the day in Yellow Springs picking pumpkins, hiking, and eating ice cream.  When Antoine and I started dating he was more than happy to carry on the tradition with me, and I breathed a giant sigh of relief that pumpkin picking didn't fall to the wayside, because it makes me so freaking happy!  This year we planned to go to our usual spot, Peifer Orchards in Yellow Spring but as a bonus Amanda and Aaron (and their dog Gatsby) decided to trek down from Cleveland to meet up with us!  We arrived at Peifer a little before Amanda and Aaron (not surprising since it's much closer to YS from Cincinnati than from Cleveland!), but decided to make our way to the field since pumpkin picking for me tends to be a very intense and time-involved process.  The lovely people at Peifer warned us before we headed out to the field that they had had a lot of rain the previous week which flooded their fields, so there might not be any pumpkins to pick.  Still we remained optimistic that there'd be some pumpkins to pick.

 "Come on, guys!  To the pumpkins!"

Unfortunately, only a couple pumpkins survived the flooding of the field and I only found one pumpkin to pick...

Still, we wandered around for a while.  I snapped some photos while Cheese smelled everything imaginable!

 And then I spotted a couple ducks with a bunch of little ducklings trailing behind them...

 How cute is that?!

 Basset butt.

Next to Peifer there is a greenhouse/farm with a variety of different animals.  Shortly after we arrived at the fields we saw this guy.  He really wanted to be Cheese's friend...Cheese wasn't so sure he wanted to be his though! 

 Cheese would get close and then when the horse bent down to sniff his head Cheese would hurry off!

We were definitely bummed that there were no pumpkins to pick, but after Antoine did a little calling around he found that Young's Dairy (which was on our list of activities for the day anyway), just a half mile down the road, also had pumpkin picking.  So we told Amanda and Aaron there was a change of plans and to meet us at Young's.  As we were leaving the fields I spotted another duck with a big group of ducklings following her.

 

I've been to Young's Dairy many, many times (it's actually one of my most favorite ice creams!), but I've never actually been pumpkin picking at Young's.  Let me just say, it was awesome!  There were so many pumpkins and their field is so large!!  I really had a hard time narrowing down which pumpkins to actually take home, because I loved so many of them.

"Oh, mother."

Antoine and I (mainly it's me!) always pick way too many pumpkins to actually take home, so we always line up the candidates in a row to survey possibilities for the keepers in the bunch.  A year or two ago we started another tradition, we make Cheese pose with this assortment of pumpkins.  Because really, what's cuter than a basset hound posing in front a ton of pumpkins?! 

Oh wait, maybe this little family in front of a bunch of pumpkins!?  That's pretty adorable too!

Once we chose all our pumpkins, paid (thanks again, Amanda and Aaron, for the perfect wedding present!), and packed up trunks full of pumpkins we were all ready for a some delicious ice cream and fried cheese curds!

Mmm!  My personal favorite, chocolate peanut butter in a freshly made waffle cone.

Despite the little hiccup at Peifer, our pumpkin picking adventure turned out to be very successful and fun!  And we now have another place in Yellow Spring for pumpkin picking.  After Young's we did a little hiking before parting ways and heading home, but I'll share those photos later this week.  Until then, happy Tuesday!  Are you as ready for the long weekend as I am?!

On a little sidenote, Antoine and I have been married for exactly six months today!  Six years and six months ago today, he picked me up for a date, 45 minutes late, and we ate fondue together while I'll babbled on and he listened.  Now I can't imagine my life without him!  He's such a caring, funny man and I absolutely love the life and home we've created together.  Happy six-month-anniversary, Tran!