Summer has not arrived to the pacific northwest, so it seems a little strange to be posting about strictly summer activities like berry picking. We have had just a handful of days with temps above the mid 60's in the last two months. And rain...so much rain! We have broken all the old records for the most rainfall in May and June and a lot of people are calling this month "Juneuary". It feels more like fall to me, but I get their point! I read online today that since April 1st, our area has only had 4 days of what the national weather service would term as "sunny days". So while the calendar on the wall says that its time for berry picking, my internal calendar is telling me it couldn't possibly be time yet, berry picking is for warm sunny summer days!
Luckily, I have been listening to the wall calendar and we spent two days last week strawberry picking. We went Monday morning and picked 32 1/4 pounds, and then made a totally spur of the moment trip on Friday morning and picked another 34 pounds. I had planned on going just once a week, but the kids and I were out running errands and it was a rare sunny morning so we spontaneously decided to take advantage of it and get the berries while we could.
Killian and Rowan had a great time in the fields, they look forward to this all year!
I was so proud of how well they did while I was picking. Its very important to me when we u-pick that the kids understand the fact that they have been invited into what amounts to someones home, and that they need to be respectful of that. I don't want them running around stepping on plants, throwing berries, picking things and not eating them, or in anyway being rude or obnoxious. They understand that the farmers make a living off of the food that we are picking, and that wasting it is taking money away from the farmers and their families. Since this was our first u-pick experience of the year, I was worried that they may have forgotten, but I shouldn't have been. They did so great, staying on the paths, and being careful not to squish any plants. I was so proud of them! Since I knew that I could trust them, I let them wander around while I was in a row picking. They got pretty far, can you see them in this picture?
Zooming in with the camera lens, I saw that they were busy picking and eating all the ripe strawberries they could find! This u-pick encourages sampling while picking, and they were taking full advantage of that!
Rowan came back from the lower field to give me some berries, and told me that she got them from "down south". I asked "down south???" And she said "Yeah mama....you DO know what down south means....don't you?" I laughed so hard - I don't know where she got the idea that the lower fields were down south, but it was so cute.
Killian was really good about helping her on the long walk "up north", and carried her around on his back for a good portion of it:
He also entertained them with picture taking, I love this one he took of Rowan:
And a very goofy self portrait he took - silly guy!
He took a picture of me and Rowan sticking her strawberry filled belly out:
After an hour of picking on Friday, I covered quite a bit of ground. We started next to the cars, and ended where the white flags are:
It felt like a huge distance to me, but Matthew pointed out it was actually pretty short to have walked away with almost 35 pounds of berries. And speaking of, this is what all those berries look like set out on my counter:
So far I have canned 23 pints of strawberry jam, and frozen enough berries to fill 4 gallon sized Ziploc bags. We canned more than that last year, and ran out before berry season was upon us again, so my goal is to do another batch of strawberry (about 9 pints) and maybe some more for freezing. One of the kids favorite treats are frozen yogurt popsicles with berries, so I need to make sure I have enough to make lots of those. Once strawberries are done, its on to raspberries! Then blueberries, peaches, pears, apples....I am so excited that u-pick season is here again, I have so many plans for this year of preserving food. Hopefully the weather will get itself figured out soon and give us lots of sunny ripening days!
Luckily, I have been listening to the wall calendar and we spent two days last week strawberry picking. We went Monday morning and picked 32 1/4 pounds, and then made a totally spur of the moment trip on Friday morning and picked another 34 pounds. I had planned on going just once a week, but the kids and I were out running errands and it was a rare sunny morning so we spontaneously decided to take advantage of it and get the berries while we could.
Killian and Rowan had a great time in the fields, they look forward to this all year!
I was so proud of how well they did while I was picking. Its very important to me when we u-pick that the kids understand the fact that they have been invited into what amounts to someones home, and that they need to be respectful of that. I don't want them running around stepping on plants, throwing berries, picking things and not eating them, or in anyway being rude or obnoxious. They understand that the farmers make a living off of the food that we are picking, and that wasting it is taking money away from the farmers and their families. Since this was our first u-pick experience of the year, I was worried that they may have forgotten, but I shouldn't have been. They did so great, staying on the paths, and being careful not to squish any plants. I was so proud of them! Since I knew that I could trust them, I let them wander around while I was in a row picking. They got pretty far, can you see them in this picture?
Zooming in with the camera lens, I saw that they were busy picking and eating all the ripe strawberries they could find! This u-pick encourages sampling while picking, and they were taking full advantage of that!
Rowan came back from the lower field to give me some berries, and told me that she got them from "down south". I asked "down south???" And she said "Yeah mama....you DO know what down south means....don't you?" I laughed so hard - I don't know where she got the idea that the lower fields were down south, but it was so cute.
Killian was really good about helping her on the long walk "up north", and carried her around on his back for a good portion of it:
He also entertained them with picture taking, I love this one he took of Rowan:
And a very goofy self portrait he took - silly guy!
He took a picture of me and Rowan sticking her strawberry filled belly out:
After an hour of picking on Friday, I covered quite a bit of ground. We started next to the cars, and ended where the white flags are:
It felt like a huge distance to me, but Matthew pointed out it was actually pretty short to have walked away with almost 35 pounds of berries. And speaking of, this is what all those berries look like set out on my counter:
So far I have canned 23 pints of strawberry jam, and frozen enough berries to fill 4 gallon sized Ziploc bags. We canned more than that last year, and ran out before berry season was upon us again, so my goal is to do another batch of strawberry (about 9 pints) and maybe some more for freezing. One of the kids favorite treats are frozen yogurt popsicles with berries, so I need to make sure I have enough to make lots of those. Once strawberries are done, its on to raspberries! Then blueberries, peaches, pears, apples....I am so excited that u-pick season is here again, I have so many plans for this year of preserving food. Hopefully the weather will get itself figured out soon and give us lots of sunny ripening days!