NOTE: This story is a sidebar to UMNS #479. Photographs are available.
A UMNS Feature
By Kathy L. Gilbert*
Members
of Fellowship United Methodist Church in Murfreesboro, Tenn.,
congratulate one another after unloading some 2,000 pumpkins from
Pumpkin Patch USA. Church leaders hope to raise $8,000 to $10,000 from
sales of their load of 2,000 pumpkins. A UMNS photo by Mike DuBose.
Photo number 03-334, Accompanies UMNS #481, 10/1/03
No Long Caption Available for this Story
Workers
load pumpkins destined for church fund-raisers across the country onto
tractor trailers at the Pumpkin Patch USA fields in Farmington, N.M. The
pumpkins are grown on the Navajo Agricultural Products Industry, the
Navajo Nation's farming and agribusiness enterprise, pumping more than
$2 million into the local Navajo economy through jobs and land rent
permits. A UMNS photo by Mike DuBose. Photo number 03-335, Accompanies
UMNS #481, 10/8/03
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Lyndsey
Collins, 5, helps unload pumpkins from a Pumpkin Patch USA truck at
Fellowship United Methodist Church in Murfreesboro, Tenn. Youth leaders
at the church hope to raise $8,000 to $10,000 from sales of their load
of 2,000 pumpkins. A UMNS photo by Mike DuBose. Photo number 03-333,
Accompanies UMNS #481, 10/6/03
No Long Caption Available for this Story
Workers
pick pumpkins destined for church fund-raisers across the country at
the Pumpkin Patch USA fields in Farmington, N.M. The pumpkins are grown
on the Navajo Agricultural Products Industry, the Navajo Nation's
farming and agribusiness enterprise, pumping more than $2 million into
the local Navajo economy through jobs and land rent permits. A UMNS
photo by Mike DuBose. Photo number 03-338, Accompanies UMNS #481,
10/6/03
No Long Caption Available for this Story
Dogs
belonging to a trucker working for Pumpkin Patch USA in Farmington,
N.M., peer out the window of the truck while their owner completes
paperwork in the scale house. Some 700 truckloads of pumpkins will be
shipped to churches across the country for use in fund-raising projects
this year. A UMNS photo by Mike DuBose. Photo number 03-336,
Accompanies UMNS #481, 10/6/03
No Long Caption Available for this Story
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. (UMNS) - Jill Vogle and about
50 of her closest friends are spending a windy Sunday afternoon
unloading 2,000 pumpkins from the back of an 18-wheel truck.
Vogle
is the senior high youth director at Fellowship United Methodist Church
and a new recruit to Pumpkin Patch USA, a company that sends pumpkins
to churches to sell for fund-raisers.
"We will be here seven days
a week for the entire month of October," she says. "Sunday we're open
from noon to 6 p.m., and Monday through Saturday we're here from 10 a.m.
to 6 p.m."
The youth group of about 60 will be out in the
pumpkin patch every day, working to raise money for their summer mission
trips, summer camps and other youth events.
Fellowship's
pumpkins were packed on the truck Sept. 25 in Farmington, N.M., and
arrived at the church in Murfreesboro around 1:30 p.m. Sept. 28.
Fellowship is one of nearly 700 United Methodist churches selling the
pumpkins during October.
The pumpkins sell from $2 to $35, with
some of the smaller ones going for 50 cents to $1. Congregations keep 25
to 40 percent of the profit, depending on gross sales volume.
"Our
goal is to raise anywhere from $8,000 to $10,000," Vogle says.
Laughing, she adds, "That's our goal, and that may be a high goal, but
that's kind of what we're shooting for right now.
"I've talked
to a couple of different churches that say this is a really good
fund-raiser for them because not only does it let the youth get more
involved in the church, it brings the community in too, and it's just a
really good outreach," she says. "… And it's also a big fund-raiser,
so we don't have to have constant fund-raisers through the course of the
year." # # # *Gilbert is a United Methodist News Service news writer.