Credle Family: Hartland Orchard Part 2: Fall Festival and Pumpkin Patch

Not quite peak, but still pretty!

One of the kids' favorite fall books is Mercer Meyer's Fall Festival. We love all our Mercer Meyer books, but this is a special one because of the "ad libbing" Daddy does while reading.

While we were at Harland this visit, I couldn't help but think of this book. Caramel apples, a hay ride, corn maze, it's not quite Cox Farms, where the kids and I went on a field trip last fall, but it's getting there. Each year they add a few more activities for the kids. I still much prefer this smaller festival to the larger "commercial" Cox Farms.

This basketball was a new activity.

We like our old favorites. This slide being one.

We caught the tail end of the pig race (no pun intended) a little after we did the hay ride.

Dan loves milking this cow.
His little friend from school, Madison, was at Hartland that day, too.
We've run into her twice now. Once at BJ's and then at the festival. Dan blushed in BJs when she said hello to him. It was sooooo cute.

We had to wait a while to get on the hayride, and they shortened the trip quite a bit only going around a short circle, not like the longer ride up over the hills they've done in past years. I was a little disappointed.

We remembered the year we went later in October, and we got to roll some rotten pumpkins down a hill. You can read about it here: Hartland October 2012. After reading that post, I am even more disappointed in the hayride from this trip. I forgot we even stopped the hayride to pick some leftover raspberries on that trip. Goes back to bigger is not always better. Hartland is obviously trying to keep up with the other local festivals and skimping so that they can get in bigger crowds. Boo to that.