MOSES LAKE - Some of the second-graders weren't really interested in having their picture taken. "Where are the pumpkins?" the boys asked.

But there's a tradition when second-graders from Peninsula Elementary visit the pumpkin patch owned by teacher Joan Dopps. A second-grader, apparently with some experience, explained it to a friend.

The second-graders each get an apple, she said, "then we get to pet her dog and pick our pumpkins." This year the second-graders petted the goats instead of the dog, but they still got an apple off the Red and Golden Delicious trees in the Dopps' yard and walked to the big pumpkin patch to pick out their own pumpkin.

It's been 27 years that the second-graders have been coming to the pumpkin patch, Dopps said. It's been so long that some of the kids are the second generation, she said.

Her late husband Tom was an enthusiastic supporter of the pumpkin patch. Tom Dopps died in 2012, a few days before the annual visit, but the kids came just the same, like he would've wanted.

Second-graders fanned out over the field full of vines, looking for just the right big fat orange pumpkin. They considered. They pondered. They weighed their options. But eventually they had to pick a pumpkin. Some kids went for pumpkins that were almost too big to carry. Others opted for little tiny decorative pumpkins.

A girl who had tagged along with her big sister and little brother had her sights on a nice orange pumpkin, but it was just a little too heavy. "Mama, I'm having trouble here," she complained. Mom was happy to help, but she abandoned that pumpkin in favor of enough little pumpkins to fill her tiny red wagon.

It's a big patch of pumpkins, and it's a big job, Dopps said, especially without Tom to help. "I had help this year," she said, from her family as well as a donation from the Peninsula PTO. Dopps received a grant from the Washington State Retired Teachers Association, she said, and gets a price break on the pumpkin seeds from the Logan Zinner seed company.