Here in the Midwest EVERYONE with kids visits the pumpkin patch every single fall. It’s like our own little way of officially welcoming in the fall season.
If you’ve never been to a pumpkin patch you are surely missing out. It’s a whole experience that you will look back on and remember fondly. And you’ll get some really great pictures because pumpkins make all fall pictures 100% better!
This year we visited a fairly new pumpkin patch, The Pumpkin Pad, and I have to say it was even better than we expected! This was their second year being open so we were expecting them to have a few activities for the kids but we were so wrong! They had an inflatable jumping pad, bounce house, super awesome round swings made from sturdy netting, tractor rides, giant slide, a huge corn pit to dig in, bean bag toss, a tall grass maze {which my husband and I weren’t totally accepting of but the girls LOVED it} and so much more! All for $10/person, they let our 2 yr old in for free and their pumpkins were SUPER AFFORDABLE…say what!
Here are my top 5 reasons why we choose to support a small local farm each year vs a big oversized money maker
1. Owning our own brick & mortar shop we know the importance of supporting small local business. We try to shop small as much and often as we can. At the end of the day I would rather our hard earned money go to supporting a family rather than some super rich person, whenever we can.
2. When you visit a big name patch, especially if you go on a weekend, it will likely be crowded. But at a small family owned pumpkin patch the people come in much lower numbers. You have room to roam and enjoy your time there without your anxiety going through the roof {or the clouds because you are outside 😉 }
3. The prices are usually WAY more affordable overall. We have a bigger family so anytime we do anything like this it usually puts a small dent in the wallet. The small farm we visited this year had GREAT prices on their admission and their pumpkins! We were pleasantly surprised! Everyone got pumpkins, our two year old got a few, all for $20! We couldn’t have gone to Walmart and got everyone a pumpkin for that price.
4. They are usually a TRUE PUMPKIN PATCH! Meaning the pumpkins are still on the vine and you cut them off yourself. This is a fun experience for everyone. We’ve been to other big name patches with our girl’s school field trips that have already precut ALL the pumpkins and leave them in the fields or they don’t have the patch at all and have the pumpkins ready for “picking” on bales of straw all around the farm. There’s nothing wrong with either of those ways but we enjoy picking them straight off the vine.
We’ve found that the small farms are usually the true YOU PICK farm. Which for our family never gets old!
5. The owners put so much love and their own hard work into their farms! As soon as you walk up you are welcomed with a big smile from likely the owner of the farm. They are so proud of what they have created for your family to come and enjoy and make endless memories.
I hope this encourages you to support your own local farms. Knowing you are supporting another family is something so special! Each and every local farmer we’ve met has been genuinely kind and grateful to all in the community that supports their small business.
