Apparently, the only reason I blog these days is 1) when there are birthdays 2) we are evacuated for wildfires and 3) pumpkin season!
It was a sub-par growing season due to late-spring and early-fall freezes, deer, health issues and lack of time. Our “fun” COVID project was finishing our basement and while it almost put Jamie in the grave, we are mostly finished. There are still a lot of projects to do like putting up shelves, Hadley’s closet, etc. but when we are done, I’ll share Jamie’s video about it. We have not enjoyed this house because we haven’t had an area where we can entertain friends and family but now, finally, our rec and theater rooms are the perfect place to do so…and now COVID is here and we can’t entertain anyway.
Anyhew, back to our growing season. This is Jamie’s second season growing in a greenhouse and his pumpkin never really took off (see above reasons) but Bode got really lucky with two great plants. We debated canceling the pumpkin party (because, you know, COVID) but we ended up scaling way back and had a smorgasbord of soups and pumpkin bread.
The show must go on…and hopefully next year’s will include our traditional potluck and s’mores bar.
Fancy pics are from our National Geographic photographer friend, Justin Bowen
The others are (obviously) from yours truly.
My Dad arrived the night before the party for a wonderful two-week-long visit.
Smashing pumpkins has become a new favorite activity.
The Weigh-off
There are a lot of things we miss about Colorado and a big one is the weigh-off at Jared’s Nursery because they would go all-out with a fun fall festival with games, a spookhouse, food trucks and so much more. Utah’s location, Thanksgiving Point, is a popular venue but they relegated the pumpkin “festival” to the parking lot with a few lackluster booths.
Fortunately, despite COVID, the location in a pavilion was much better than in previous years. We arrived early for the junior division. Bode was only allowed to enter one of his pumpkins so he entered his smaller pumpkin as an exhibition. He smoked most of the competition with his 516.5-pounder.
His second pumpkin was measuring to be around that same weight so image his delight when it went heavy at 635 pounds!
He took home first place which included a ribbon and tickets to Thanksgiving Point.
But the real prize was his shrewd negotiating and he sold his large pumpkin for $275 to Cornbelly’s.
Jamie was hoping to eek out at least 1,000 pounds. His pumpkin weighed 997 pounds.
Oh, 2020, what an evil temptress you are.
In Denver, Jamie and the pumpkins were quite the celebrities and we’d go on tour to schools, events and festivals. Oh, and not be forgotten is the year Jamie jumped out of a pumpkin!
Since moving here four years ago, that month between the weigh-off and Halloween has been…disappointing. We live in a quiet corner and rarely see anyone stopping by to see the pumpkin. So, last year when Pumpkin Nights offered to buy our pumpkin, we were all-in. We figured we wouldn’t be so lucky with all of the festivals canceled due to COVID this year but Jamie and Bode sold their other pumpkins to Daybreak for their pumpkin display.
And the icing on the cake? Bode landed on the front page of our local newspaper for his big win, just like his dad a couple of years before.
Apparently, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree the pumpkin doesn’t grow far from the plant.
I'm a Canadian-born mom of two, former Denver Post columnist, family travel writer, editor of MileHighMamas.com and 9News contributor. Expert on all things Utah, Denver, family and travel. Lover of laughter and life. Happily married to a man obsessed with growing The Great Pumpkin. 