Rick Kimbrell was enjoying a football game, rooting for the University of Texas Longhors, when his wife came in with a great idea: How about a trip to a pumpkin patch?

A what? Asked Mr. Kimbrell, who had a field of orange right before his eyes.

But before the game was over, Kim Kimbrell was leading her husband to a farm near Louisburg, Kan. And what they saw at her cousin’s place – people picking pumpkins, feeding animals and riding wagons – was a moving experience.

"We thought this was something we could do," Mrs. Kimbrell said. "We’d always wanted to be on a farm."

A year later, in 1995, the couple and their two boys left the noise and congestion building across west McKinney, moving 12 miles up Custer Road and back to the, for now, slower pace of northern Collin County.

They settled on 40 acres east of Celina, on a crest where you can hear the slightest breeze and see more than the brightest stars. They erected a house, "something that didn’t look new," Mr. Kimbrell said.

And they began trying to pull a living out of the dirt, creating a spot where city folks can get out – if only for a while.

First Crop

"We said, ‘Let’s just do the pumpkin farm and see if anyone comes,’" said Mr. Kimbrell, who grew up in Richardson, not far from Custer Road, and works for his family’s cleaning products business in Dallas.

The 1983 Pearce High School graduate had never worked dirt, as did his grandparents, who raised cotton near Lubbock. He has cousins farming about 7,000 acres in West Texas. His agricultural roots "gave me the itch," and, with little experience in the field, the couple started scratching the dirt.

They gave away or sold their first crop in 1997. And they began keeping an eye on the gravel road out front last year.

"We’d say, ‘Are they stoppin? Are they stopping?’" said Mrs. Kimbrell, 33.

By Halloween, the couple figures, 8,000 to 10,000 people had visited the farm, buying all of the pumpkins, riding the wagon, petting the sheep, goats and other animals, and generally having a time outdoors.

"People are laways looking for something to do," said Mr. Kimbrell, 34. "You can tell some of the men have been dragged out here," particularly during football games.

More Visitors

This year’s season in under way with the early turnout tripling last year’s numbers. A $3 admission gets you a hot dog and hayride; pumpkins cost extra. And after a disappointing crop, Mr. Kimbrell is counting on help.

"That patch there won’t take care of our pumpkin needs," he said recently, pointing to a 6-acre plot likely to bear 500 or so pieces of fruit.

Grasshoppers wiped out a 3-acre patch, and a hot, dry summer reduced his yield for the second year in a row. So he again will haul in West Texas pumpkins, about 80,000 pound, and put them in the field.

"It’s like hiding Easter eggs," Mr. Kimbrell said, for a sometimes-unsuspecting audience. "People say, ‘Do they just fall off the vine by themselves?’"

His farming cousins last year laughed at the couple’s venture. "This is an overgrown garden to them," he said.

But last year’s success and this year’s imports have the cousins thinking about growing pumpkins themselves. "They got interested when they heard the numbers," Mr. Kimbrell said.

Country Living

He hopes the numbers can one day keep him at home year-round, working the dirt instead of highway traffic.

And he knows the days of open fields and dusty roads around his farm are likely numbered, particularly if families, like the Kimbrells, keep moving north for the most convenient and affordable piece of quiet.

Frisco, 12 miles to the south, is among the region’s fastest-growing cities with a fourfold population increase this decade and a regional shopping mall on the way.

McKinney is growing north toward the Kimbrells’ home, as are housing developments in and around nearby Prosper and Celina.

Collin County’s transportation plan calls for a new highway looping McKinney south of their home.

The North Texas Tollway Authority wants to extend the Dallas North Tollway through Collin County, about six miles to the west.

A friend in real estate told the couple that suburbia is at least 14 years away from the pumpkin farm. And as it comes, growth will probably ride up FM2478, also known as Custer Road, a mile from their farm.

"We’ll enjoy this as long as we can," Mr. Kimbrell said.