Friday morning, my sister-in-law and Peach and I set out to Roloff Farms, home of Little People, Big World. (It's located about 15 minutes from my house.) S-I-L Elina is a huge fan of the show, and I am a closet huge fan of the show... and Peach is at the perfect age for her first trip to a pumpkin patch! It was perfect.
We arrived two minutes before 10, opening time. There was already a line of cars!
(Parking was $2. I don't know why this is important, but I thought I'd throw it out there.)
While we were waiting in the car line, family members cruised by in Mom Amy's minivan (Amy was riding and waved at the guy selling the parking tickets to us).
We probably spent ten, fifteen minutes in the car line before things started moving. And once we got to the top of this hill, we turned right into the parking lot. And there it all was, just like the TV show! Elaborate home, catapult, the swimming pool, the soccer field, volleyball court, etc. It's all there.
TLC was there filming, and Dad Matt Roloff was in front letting people take pictures with him. While Elina and Peach were posing with him, Peach decided to melt down and have a little mini-tantrum. My best shot?
You can see Peach's arm, at least!
We figured out how to buy tickets to the two tours (they added a second, scenic tour this year). Tickets for both tours: $10 per person.
The scenic tour was first. Our tractor driver? Son Jeremy. Our tour guide? Brittany. Not bad! Finn Elina got points for being the person in our tour who came the furthest.
Peach loved the tractor ride, and keeps talking about it.
(Here she is saying, "I ride tractor, too!")
After the scenic tour, I took Elina's picture with Jeremy - it turned out beautifully, and I hope she reads this and emails me it so I can post it! - then we found the port-a-potties (oh, SO much fun to attempt a diaper change in one of those)! and got in line for the "western town" tour.
(I owe my kid's great behavior during much of this experience to tic-tacs, gummi bears, and raisins.)
I have no idea who the driver or tour guide were for these, but the highlight was stopping at the western town and meeting Pop and Honey, Matt Roloff's parents. They were super, super sweet, and posed for a picture with Elina (which is alas, on Elina's camera, too).
At this point, we'd been there about an hour and a half, and the place was crammed with people. Tour groups from assisted living facilities, Kindercare classes, and it was crazy. We skipped the petting zoo and pony rides and headed into the pumpkin patch.
Peach went for the biggest ones she could find, until I started asking her to find small pumpkins (there were no wagons free to use - all taken)!
(But even small pumpkins can be kind of heavy!)
And gourds are kind of crazy looking!
In any event, I walked away with three pumpkins (total price: $9), a pack of gummy worms ($3) and a Diet Pepsi ($2), a very exhausted toddler, and a happy sister in law. And it was fun. The crowds were the worst part: I don't like crowds, anyway, but the fawning touristy types were obnoxious. Heavily made up women pushing toddlers out of the way to get their pictures taken with the family? That is so not cool. Also, it was kind of sad - most of the people there were so busy snapping photos of the Roloff family that they weren't really into it as the experience for their kid that it ought to have been. (At some point I realized I was the only person taking pictures of my own family during the tractor tours, instead of members of the Roloff family!)
Overall, I had a great time. I would have enjoyed going to any pumpkin patch with Peach, but the reality show overlay made it thoroughly fun. Also, I can't say I would have been all that excited to wait in lines to go on tractor rides of just any farmer's property (twice), which was clearly the highlight for Peach. It was win-win.
Tips: get there as early as you can, and do what we did and go on Friday, instead of a weekend day. (The Farm is open Friday-Sundays in October.) Bring your own food and water and snacks for the kids. Avoid the women with spray-on tans and Kate Gosselin hairstyles.
Very cool! You just made me realize that we have not made it to the pumpkin patch yet this year. And I am stunned that you got 3 pumpkins for $9--we pay at least $9 for each pumpkin if we go to a pumpkin patch!
Posted by: LC | October 11, 2009 at 09:42
LC: they were *really* small pumpkins! It was 35¢ per pound - I have no idea if that's a good price or not. It looked to me that most of them had come from elsewhere (there is no way they could have grown enough for the crowds they have, otherwise).
Posted by: Shelley | October 11, 2009 at 20:14