...Once upon a time, sometime last year, A's 3rd grade class did a project garden. Everyone in the class took a soda bottle that had been cut in half and planted seeds that the teacher gave them. There were grass seeds, lima beans seeds, sunflower seeds and cantelope seeds.

The kids took very good care of their plants, but A was especially devoted. She made doubly sure she had sun every day, and plenty of water. She worried over her plants on the weekends and on hot days when she feared she might be leaving the plants outside for too long. She was more attentive when they played outside and the plants were out, in case someone threw something and knocked the soda bottles down.

Sometimes things happen, and a lima bean pod did not survive because something was thrown across the room, or someone banged the tops of the soda bottles too hard and a pod got beheaded. And that happened to A's lima bean pods, but still they grew on.

Eventually they brought them home, and that became the catalyst for our garden we planted in the late spring. A wanted her plants planted - and we thought that planting some tomatoes, peppers, and peas might not be a bad idea. Basil also got added to the group. We got lots of tomatoes - more than we could use. The peppers were good, but not that plentiful (and yes, DH we really need to harvest those last couple off the plant). The basil flourished and I had more than I knew what to do with - and I didn't make pesto either, and I really should have. The watermelon? Not a chance. Yes, we planted watermelon, and we got a couple of very small melons, but nothing what we were expecting.

But we were smart. We said "NO SQUASH!" Because, after all, you know what happens with squash - it takes over your yard. There's more of it produced than you know what to do with in a year. Your friends and relatives start avoiding eye contact, and eventually avoid *you* because you want to give them more of your bountiful harvest. Having been on the recieving end, and not a big fan of squashes to begin with, I knew that we were making the right decision.

So we planted our seeds, and set up our stakes, and put A's little soda bottle garden into the ground and waited. And waited. And things sprouted - the lima beans died, the sunflower didn't take. The grass blended into ours and started it's own nice little patch. And the cantelope? It flourished! It's probably what sucked the potantial life out of my peppers and watermelon. The vines started moving around, and the leaves grew, and I said that that was a successful cantelope plant, if only we'd get some fruit from it.

We watched it grow and flower, and something started to niggle at my brain. Because those were large orange flowers. LARGE. And while the leaves were still similar to the melon leaves I remembered from my grandmother's melon patches, something just didn't seem quite right. My MIL commented that we were growing squash - I looked at her and said no... it's supposed to be cantelope. And she agreed that it looked like it could be cantelope too.

Later on, we found fruit. Something was starting to grow! And we were pleased. Finally! A cantelope! But then it got bigger. And bigger. And changed shape a little bit. And it wasn't developing that nice pebbled rind that cantelopes usually have. It was.... smoother.

I think the really telling sign was when the stem was starting to get rather... stalklike, and the little round thing that was growing went from green to yellow. That's when we got suspicious and looked at A and asked if she was sure it was cantelope. She nodded with great conviction. So we put a bet up on the whiteboard in the kitchen, listing our predictions for what the little yellow-rapidly-turning-golden-orange thing was. A listed that she thought it might be a watermelon instead of a cantelope. I wondered what drugs they're putting in lunchmeat for her to think *that*. The rest of us? We said....

PUMPKIN!

And so it came to be that A finally changed her vote, and agreed that it was indeed a pumpkin. And I hear that the teacher was informed, with some amusement, that it was not cantelope that was growing, but pumpkin instead. Eventually we harvested it, but DH forgot to take a picture of A with her 'cantelope', else I'd share that here. And so the pumpkin sat and waited for Halloween to pass - and we didn't decorate it. And Thanksgiving came. And we stared at the 'cantelope' and I decreed....

PIE. It must be pie.

So, last week, after mostly getting over my flu, I beheaded the beast, rubbed butter and brown sugar inside it, put the scalp back on and shoved it in the oven. After roasting it a couple of times, it got pureed and made into pie. And there's still about two cups of puree left in my fridge, just waiting to be used - most likely it will become another pie. And so there you have it folks. For Thanksgiving this year, my family ate Cantelope Pie. And what happened to the seeds, you ask? Well, DH and B went and spread/scattered those in the garden. And fortune and fate made it rain a day or two later. Assuming that the birds and squirrels didn't run off with all of the seeds before it rained, we may have 'cantelope' pie again next year. And maybe even more 'cantelopes' than we'll know what to do with, so if I run into you in the grocery store next fall...

...I'll totally understand when you hide behind the banana stand to avoid me.