Blueberries for Finley and Eliot

Remember that story, Blueberries for Sal? It's always been one of my favorites and yesterday, we acted out the story with our friends Lisa (Lee-sha), Sangwha (Wah), and Eliot (A-yot) at Honey Pot Hill. Thankfully, we skipped the bear scene from the story and just stuck with grown-ups picking berries and plunking them into boxes while toddlers ate their fill. The blueberries were plentiful and delicious (tart, not sweet). We got a tip to head to the back end of the patch and spent most of our time there.

Finley and Eliot were super excited to see all the blueberries and happily carried their moms' boxes around snacking on more than a few.

Here's a shot of Finley's first taste of freshly picked blueberries.

Just as another blueberry-picking mom had told us when we arrived, after about 10 minutes the kids will get their fill and then you can actually make progress filling up your container.

They were in berry heaven and had fun wandering around the two rows we were in. After a thorough lesson from me about which blueberries where for picking (the big blue ones) and those that had to be left on the bush (the purple or green baby ones), Finley eventually figured it out and was picking some himself. He would pick one, hold it up and yell "biggie! eat?" and if I approved, he would stuff it in his mouth. While his color knowledge is still questionable, perhaps blue has made an impact on him this weekend! He was really a lot of fun to pick with, he was so interested in the whole process and the scenery around him (plus a couple of planes flew over which was awesome).

We were probably picking for close to an hour and had a sweet pile of blueberries to show for it, not to mention lots of blueberries in our bellies and our very purple fingers. Here is Finley and I's 2 Quart box filled to the brim.

Not bad, right? After picking, we checked out some of the farm animals and went into the farm store. I got Finley an "early" apple to eat on the way home, which he gnawed on successfully. However, the main plot of the ride home (30+ min) was having Sangwha in the backseat between the two carseats keeping both kids from falling asleep. She worked overtime and did everything from talking to singing to tickling to eventually just poking them. Good work and mission accomplished since we were able to put them down at our house for real naps.

Epilogue:

Finley and I made blueberry pancakes this morning (too bad that only called for like 20 blueberries) and will make blueberry muffins tonight. We also gave some to Charlotte and Gabi after our trip to the children's museum this morning. So many more to eat, good thing Dan likes them because it will save us a trip to the farmers' market this week to stock up on summer fruit!