Little house, big house!

I hope everyone had a good weekend, and feels ready to go back to work tomorrow. 

 

Our yard has a lot of history to it. 

The first house was built around 1925.  This tiny home belonged to Jacob T Reimer and his family of 10 when Ben and Sara Penner bought the land in 1967.  The house was torn down and the current house was built in the mid 70’s for their family of 13.  

The old foundation is now a perennial bed in the back yard. 

 

 

On an entirely different note, we are having weekly contests this summer.

This week we are giving away 15 tickets (worth $30.)

 

To enter leave a comment and tell us:
1. A favorite fall tradition your family does each year.
2. If your family or child has been to the Scarecrow Forest.

One entry per person.
Contest ends at midnight July 15, 2016.

Check out our website for more information. www.pennerpumpkins.com

 

Have fun with your group at the Scarecrow Forest.

We are still booking groups for the 2014 season.  The Scarecrow Forest would love to have a very busy summer and fall so we are looking for groups to book an outing to our place.  We open May 20 and go til the end of October.  At the Forest your group can walk the Scarecrow path and look at child friendly scarecrows (Goldilocks, Little Bo Peep, etc.).  Than you can expend some energy on the bales of fun with 3 slides.  Feed Billy the goat some corn and pet a baby horse (colt), baby goats (kids), kittens, and some chicks.  If you would like we can give a talk on pumpkins (from how we prepare to the garden til they turn ripe) and a talk on chickens or cows.  We have a gorgeous picnic area for your group to have a picnic lunch.  For more information please check our website: www.pennerpumpkins.com or give Shirley a call at 204-371-5556.  We would love to see your group at the Scarecrow Forest.

Cost is $8.00 per person (which includes one activity train ride, zip line, duck races, etc.) and most groups spend between 3 to 4 hours here.  Groups should be 20 or more (if you have a smaller group please give Shirley a call and she can work something out with you).  The Scarecrow Forest is your farm for family friendly fun.

Chloe and Besty, the girl goats who are expecting kids this month.

Jenny with her new colt (male foal).

The giant corn box.

The Scarecrow Forest path.

The Scarecrow Forest staff.

Social Media Sites equals Confusion

I have been looking at various ways of advertisiting for the Scarecrow Forest and I never knew that there was this many social media sites.  I have tried a few and my wish is that they would join together and be one.  I'm guess that wish would be the same as wishing that all countries would join together and be one.  So I've decided to just focus on the easier ones and put my time and energy into them.

Social Media Sites:

Twitter:  The Scarecrow Forest is not on it and will never be on it.  LOL.  I don't understand hashtags and tweets.  This one confuses me to much so I'm not ready to decode this one.

Google Plus:  I have tried this one and I've found people weren't engaging on the Scarecrow Forest's page so I have let this one go static.  If people do stumble on the page all the information on the Scarecrow Forest is there.

Facebook:  I regularly use this one and have two pages: The Scarecrow Forest and Penner Pumpkins.  I find facebook easy to use, but find it hard to get people to engage with and interact with the content I post.

Tumblr:  This is a new one I have recently started experimenting with and time will tell if it works.  You can find us here: The Scarecrow Forest.

Instagram:  This is another new one I am experimenting with.  I love taking pictures and looking at pictures so I'm thinking this one should be fun.  To see pictures I have posted search for The Scarecrow Forest or Penner Pumpkins.

Blogs:  As you can tell I don't regularly blog.  I love writing, but find it hard finding relevant content to write about.

Check out The Scarecrow Forest on the various social media sites and please don't be afraid to follow, like, comment, or whatever you are suppose to do the site.  I love when people engage with the content I post.

Lorissa

Will my pumpkin rot?

You found the perfect time pumpkin.  The only problem is, it's Oct. 1st.  Will the pumpkin last til Halloween?  Yes, if you store it right.

Tip 1:  Don't put it on cement or good wood.  Find a piece of cardboard or an old piece of wood.
Tip 2:  When it goes below 0 and the pumpkin is outside, cover with a towel or blanket.

For more tips check out these websites:
Storing pumpkins
More tips

Make sure to check out Penner Pumpkins for all things pumpkins.

Lorissa

What kind of Pumpkin to use for baking?

I did an experiment to see what is the best pumpkin for cooking and baking.  I used:

1. Cinderella Pumpkin
2. White Pumpkin [Lumina]
3. Pie or Sugar Pumpkin
4. Standard Carving Pumpkin.

Best color goes to Cinderella.
Best taste goes to Pie or Sugar Pumpkin.
Best texture [not runny and grainy] goes to Pie or Sugar Pumpkin.
Best to peel Pie or Sugar Pumpkin.

As you can see I clearly liked the Pie or Sugar Pumpkin best.  These pumpkins are bred to have a higher sugar content and less water.  The next one I would recommend is Cinderella.  It has a beautiful color, was ok to peel [not easy, but not overly difficult], and was slightly on the more runny side.

I didn't even attempt to puree the white pumpkin.  Seed catalogues state that white pumpkins are orange on the inside, while this one was white.  I'm not about to use white pumpkin flesh in baking.

At the Forest we make Pumpkin pie, Chocolate Chip Pumpkin cookies, and Pumpkin Ginger Snaps so we do go through a lot of pumpkin.

Lorissa

Gourd vs Squash vs Pumpkin

I was at a 2 day Farmers' market in Winnipeg.  The most common question I got was "How do you cook a gourd?"  Well you can't cook a gourd they are just for decoration.  Now what is the difference between a squash and pumpkin, that's a bit tricky and I had to do some research online to really understand the difference.

What is the difference:

Here is a good link to check out Pumpkin vs Gourd vs Squash.

Well to confuse things even more a pumpkin is considered a squash.

Pumpkins are generally orange and round and can be carved.

Squash come in all shapes, sizes, and colors.

Basically you can't eat gourds, but you can eat pumpkins and squash.

Lorissa

"Scare"Crow Night.

October 18 and 25 from 7 pm to 10 pm come to the Forest and have some fun in the dark.  Walk the path in the dark and see what you might bump into.  After the walk in the dark, take a zip down the zip line in the dark.  After you've been scared come and sit by the fire while sipping a hot chocolate.  Admission is $11.50 per person.

This is a children friendly event.  There is no bats, blood, skeletons, etc. anywhere in the Forest.  At the Forest we believe in wholesome family friendly fun.  Make sure to bring a flashlight when coming down.

For more information please check our website at Penner Pumpkins.


Lorissa