Economics 101

I read an article not too long ago talking about how many farmers, faced with declining prices for their crops, have turned to farm tourism as a supplement or even a replacement for regular-way farming. Corn mazes, petting zoos, and the like have become big business. Being an Urban Mommy, I can understand this -- we are willing to drive long distances to take the Metropolitoddler for a little agrarian interlude.

So I was a little surprised today when we took our daughter to pick a pumpkin. We drove about 90 minutes outside the city and arrived at a nice kid-friendly pumpkin patch / petting zoo / corn maze / food stand. We asked if we needed to buy tickets for the hayride that would transport us to the pumpkin patch. Nope, the proprietors said, just climb aboard. We hopped onto some nice friendly bales of hay and rode off to a very sweet pumpkin patch, where we selected a pumpkin of appropriate size and took the requisite number of cute photos. Then we rode back to the farm house where the Metropolitoddler played on the playground and oinked at some pigs (and a cow) while Mr. Metropolitan went to pay for the pumpkin. When he returned, he was shaking his head.

"Guess how much the pumpkin cost?"

I thought back to the article I'd read, and looked around at the playground (free), petting zoo (free), and corn maze (free). Clearly the purchase of the pumpkin would be subsidizing all of these other freebies.

"I dunno . . . ten bucks?"

"Nope," said Mr. Metropolitan, "a buck fifty."

This would explain why farmers are having a rough time of it.

Daylight Savings Time?

Long time no see, everybody! Sorry we haven't posted in a while. In the UrbanMommyVerse, there's one gal on bedrest, another just had Baby #2, and the rest of us, well, we're busy trying to keep those two smiling!

That said, we're going to try to jumpstart our blog again. So I'm first - Daylight Savings Time. I'm starting to think it's all just a big trick to keep parents who have finally gotten their kids on some sort of sleep schedule on their toes. My son, now 9.5 months old, has become a great sleeper. He's 7pm to 7am, almost like clockwork, and rarely wakes up in the middle of the night (although lately we're having some difficulty getting him to fall asleep because he keeps sitting himself up in the crib and then not knowing how to lay down!). He's also moving to a new day care room next week where they have a more structured schedule, so we've been working on making the naps at 9:30 and 1:30, instead of whenever he's been awake for 2-3 hours. Just as we're all starting to feel somewhat scheduled and well-rested, along comes DST.

In the grand scheme of things, not such a big deal. But with starting the new room, I don't want his nap schedule to be totally off for weeks, meaning he'll be sleeping when others are awake and vice versa. And him going to sleep at 6pm would mean I wouldn't get to see him at the end of the day, which will not be fun for me.

We put him down last night at 7:30 and he woke up this morning at 7:20, and we'll try that for a few days. Any other suggestions on how to move this kid to 7-to-7 on the new clock with minimal torture (of us or him)?