It’s not fall until you’ve picked a pumpkin for Halloween. Am I right? It’s pretty new thing here in Hawaii. There aren’t very many self pick farms here in Hawaii, unlike our mainland counterparts, pumpkin patches have only been around for maaayybeee the last 10 or so years? I could totally be wrong, but I know that I surely didn’t go pumpkin picking when I was little. The closest I got to carving a pumpkin, was getting those really, REALLY, tiny pumpkins from the market, and drawing a face on them with a sharpie.

Since the advent of Pinterest, pumpkin patches have been on my mind. When my son was born, I obsessed…I mean, I carefully calculated the opportunity to take one of those super cute pumpkin patch pictures that are splattered ALL OVER Pinterest. Wait, what I mean to say is that I really wanted to have a great time picking a pumpkin from a farm, instead of Sams Club. Who am I kidding, I just wanted a good picture. We took my son when he was about to turn 1, it was a horrible experience. The farm was dusty, little man was fussy, it was hot and humid, crowded, it was just not an enjoyable experience. So, last year we skipped it and went to Disneyland instead. #happymom

This year, I thought we would have a great time. My little guy is older, he’s talkative, inquisitive, and he would be able to enjoy the experience. We decided to go to Waimanalo Farms’ Pumpkin Patch since it was closer to us and smaller than the Aloun Farms’ Pumpkin Patch.  We had a few other errands to run that day, so by the time we got there, it was around 1230pm and guess what? They ran out of pumpkins!!!! The nice lady, whose unfortunate job was to turn people away said that there would be a shipment coming in the following day, so to come back then.  They would be open all week since they ran out of pumpkins.  I should note that Hawaii has had one of the wettest summers on record, which is less than ideal growing conditions for pumpkins.  Normally, the farm grows most of their pumpkins, but because of the weather, the pumpkins started to rot!  As a result, the farms have had to bring in pumpkins from the mainland. BOO!

We tried again the following day and showed up right at 12 when they said they would be open.  We drove up the dirt road to the farm, turned into the parking lot to see, that the whole field was empty! We looked up the road to see that the shipment had literally just come in and they were still unloading, so we left and decided we would go get lunch and come back.  As we were getting back into the car to go back to the pumpkin patch, my little guy decided that this would be the day that he would throw one of THE most EPIC tantrums of all time. I started to question if this was a good idea. There was screaming, crying, tears, sweat, pee. You know things are getting real when there is pee.  I wanted to throw in the towel, I couldn’t believe this was happening, we wouldn’t have another opportunity to come back before halloween, so, we waited out the tantrum.  The screaming was so loud, that people around our car started to stare.  I don’t mind the staring as much as my husband does. Little man has never screamed that loudly in public, we had to keep checking to see if anyone was going to call the cops on us.  As I was sitting there, tuning out the screeching, I finally noticed that the screaming had stopped.  My smooth talking husband somehow convinced him to get back into his car seat, while I sat there going back in forth in my mind between “Shit, I’m not going to get my picture, we are going to Sam’s Club,” “How do I get him to be quiet without looking like a raving lunatic,” and “I can’t believe he peed his pants. SMH.”

Remember how I said there was pee? Luckily it was not from my husband, or myself (phew!), you guessed it, the tantrum was so epic that my little guy peed his pants!  Epic fail numero uno. Normally, I would just shake it off and change his clothes, no big deal.  Problem was, this was also the ONE day that I forgot to put his extra pants back in the car, I only had extra underwear! Epic fail number two. How was I supposed to take super cute pictures if my son DIDN’T HAVE ANY PANTS!? UGH! EPIC FAIL THREE!!!

Guess what I did?! I said screw it, we’re GOING to that pumpkin patch! We went straight there to find that the field magically grew pumpkins (thank goodness), no one else was there (no weird people in the background of my pictures), and they were selling their island famous LE-MO-NADE! Things were finally looking up.

I put my son back into his semi damp pants, yes I did, do not judge me.  Took off his crocs (that I have a love hate relationship with, if you’ve seen my maternity pictures, then you will know why), strapped on his Jordan’s, grabbed my camera and trudged off to the patch!  My son was so excited to see all the pumpkins. So excited that he wanted to take all of them home. He kept picking them up and throwing them back down when he saw a better one in the distance. We had to keep yelling….I mean gently reminding him to put the pumpkins down on the ground not throw them.

Let’s make a long story short, I got my super cute, Pinterest worthy (maybe?) pumpkin patch pictures. See friends, our life is not perfect, nor will I ever claim it to be.  I’m trying to survive the tantrums, just. like. YOU.  BTW if you are looking at these pictures and thinking why are we wear tank tops…Well my friends, it’s hot, way too hot to be pretending we need to be wearing sweaters.

Quick review of the Waimanalo Pumpkin Patch — If you don’t know, they will be open the rest of the week 12-5 so get those pumpkins! It’s a great mellow atmosphere.  The only downside to coming when we did was that none of the activities were running, you could just pick pumpkins, but really, I didn’t feel like hanging around that long since the dust was starting to make my allergies go nuts. Oh, and I didn’t have to lie that everything was closed! HAHA!

• Free Parking
• Free Entrance to the pumpkin patch
• Paid Activities: Sunflower maze, pumpkin cannon, petting zoo, play area, farmers market, hay ride, and cow train.
• Don’t leave without getting some Li-hing Strawberry Lemonade
• Pumpkins priced according to size not weight
• Cash only
• Lots of shaded area with picnic tables to have lunch or get out of the sun
• Lots of parking available

Happy pumpkin picking!