Berry picking

Today, Noah and I went berry picking at two adjacent farms north of town. I think it's safe to say the whole experience was a fiasco.

We started with blueberries and our goal was just two quarts. Noah, however, got hot after about 5 minutes and kept letting me know he didn't want to be there. He loudly whined, kept running off towards what I think was an electric fence, and then when I would corral him back to the blueberry bushes, he would take the basket of what I had picked and dump it out onto the ground. I guess I hadn't really thought through how long it would take to pick a quart of blueberries and when he dumped the basket the fourth time, I decided it was time to move on. All in all, I think we ended up bringing home almost a quart of blueberries mixed with dirt and straw and grass, but we'll enjoy what we have!

The blackberry picking went a lot faster. We crossed the street to the other farm, picked up some empty baskets and were told to drive out to the blackberry canes. The best pictures I got of the whole trip are of Noah running away from the blackberries and into the car! After about 5 minutes there, the farmer drove out to tell me that a storm was moving in, so we better hurry. As we were quickly picking and watching the dark clouds roll in, we ran into a snake, Noah got into some thorny bushes and then kept running over to the peach trees, which you aren't supposed to touch. And finally when it got really dark and windy, I decided it was time to call it a day. We were just shy of two quarts and as we rolled up back up to the house to pay, it started to pour and we saw some lightning that looked really close.

So I think we'll hold off on any more berry picking this summer, but I still see the potential and have hopes that we can go again, maybe next summer, and maybe Noah will have some fun! (And I think I'll take David along as backup.)