The Great One

Welp, it's taken me sixteen years of gardening, but I FINALLY did it.

 I grew a big pumpkin!

Bumper Crop

Ever since I've had a garden, I've been dreaming of growing my own Halloween pumpkin. Perhaps, like Linus, I want to believe that I have found the most sincere pumpkin patch-- not only found it, but cultivated it myself.

Unfortunately, for the first several years, the vines either didn't sprout, or they withered in July, or they thrived without setting a single fruit. Then there was the time when I had that perfect pumpkin, just the one, and right before it was perfectly ripe and ready, I returned to my garden after a few days away only to find it collapsed into a rotten heap of squash and seeds. 

Last year, I finally got my first pumpkin, a wee little kettlebell-sized thing grown from a kit I got in my stocking. It was a nice fall decoration until I roasted it for pie. I did save the seeds though, and planted them in a three-sisters mound last spring. This year? I have seven pumpkins! All on the small side, but seven!  

"What are you going to do with all of them?" a colleague asked me today when I showed them to our online class. 

"Pumpkin pie, pumpkin bread, pumpkin muffins," I started. "And, since it's National Quesadilla Day," I told her, "I might make pumpkin quesadillas." 

She and the kids laughed. 

"No seriously," I continued, "seven is a lot of pumpkins! I'm going to make pumpkin curry, pumpkin tacos, pumpkin fried rice, pumpkin pasta... 

"Pumpkin fries," she suggested.

"Yes!" I agreed, "and pumpkin tots, pumpkin rings, pumpkin kebabs, pickled pumpkin." I paused to think.

"You're like the Bubba Gump Pumpkin Company!" she said.

Right? And if I save the seeds again, next year I could have 49 pumpkins!

Out of the Running

September 5:

What happened!!!??

Just wait till next year, Charlie Brown. You'll see! Next year at this same time, I'll find the pumpkin patch that is real sincere...

The Linus Project

Here's a visual update on my bid for the sincerest pumpkin patch of the year:

August 8:

 

September 1:

He's gotta pick this one. He's got to. I don't see how a pumpkin patch can be more sincere than this one. You can look around and there's not a sign of hypocrisy. Nothing but sincerity as far as the eye can see.

Most Sincere

We have been trying to cultivate ourselves a nice cucurbitaceae for going on four seasons now. This late winter, when I was starting my seeds, I found a couple of old ones in a packet labeled "Connecticut field pumpkin," and in that most optimistic of moments, I planted one of them in my little starter cells. Flash forward six months, and that seed has grown into a vine that has taken over all the free space in our garden plot. On it there are two promising specimens and a couple of smaller back ups.

I couldn't tell you exactly why, no doubt we could connect it to any number of childhood Halloween memories, but I will be thrilled, thrilled! I say, to pick a pumpkin from my own little patch.

Here it is today:

(Fingers crossed!)