Do you remember when you were a kid in Sunday school or pre-school or day camp and you would get those little cups with a seed in them and you were supposed to take it home and plant it and learn something about life and nature, etc.? I have no recollection from my childhood of ever having one that grew into anything but a nuisance. Anywho, back around Easter, Evan brought home this little biodegradable cup from Sunday school. In it, he informed us, was a pumpkin seed. He was eager to plant the thing, and since the one thing we've never done since we moved into this house is plant any decent landscaping, Corin found a little spot in our border bed to plant the little guy. We were all very excited later in the spring when the little green shoots sprouted up through the mulch. Evan got more and more excited as it grew. He was just sure we would be growing our own pumpkins by fall. I was skeptical, but tried not to be a kill-joy. Then the thing flowered and I became a believer. Now, we are 3 months in, and the little pumpkin seed that could has taken over our entire yard. OK, not the entire yard (though that would not be impossible given that our entire yard is smaller than an endzone), but at least 20 feet of the "flower bed" we planted it in.
I don't know if you can appreciate the size of this thing from the pictures, but it is enormous. (There is monkey grass or some such thing that lines the entire bed and the pumpkin vine is behind it with the big, big leaves. I'm a city girl, so I would not have been able to tell the difference between said grass and said vine before this experience, so I'm just guessing that some of you may have need help as well.) So, if anyone out there reading this doesn't have time to make it to Burt's Pumpkin Farm come October, feel free to stop on by and pick up one of ours. I promise I'll post a picture of all the jack-o-lanterns we make for Halloween. Actually, my brother-in-law reports that if we let all the flowers turn into pumpkins, none of them will grow bigger than softballs. Rather, to get decent sized pumpkins we need to pinch off some of the blooms. Who knew? But, I think that Evan will be more impressed by number than size, so we'll just let them all go and see what happens.
I don't know if you can appreciate the size of this thing from the pictures, but it is enormous. (There is monkey grass or some such thing that lines the entire bed and the pumpkin vine is behind it with the big, big leaves. I'm a city girl, so I would not have been able to tell the difference between said grass and said vine before this experience, so I'm just guessing that some of you may have need help as well.) So, if anyone out there reading this doesn't have time to make it to Burt's Pumpkin Farm come October, feel free to stop on by and pick up one of ours. I promise I'll post a picture of all the jack-o-lanterns we make for Halloween. Actually, my brother-in-law reports that if we let all the flowers turn into pumpkins, none of them will grow bigger than softballs. Rather, to get decent sized pumpkins we need to pinch off some of the blooms. Who knew? But, I think that Evan will be more impressed by number than size, so we'll just let them all go and see what happens. 
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