Last year, around this time, I was a little over halfway through my pregnancy with Clementine when I realized how badly I wanted to take the kids strawberry picking. The strawberry season was just about over at the time and there was no way anyone could convince my pregnant self to bend over, so I decided it could wait. Fast forward to last week when we went on the perfect 75 degree, overcast day.
We have been apple picking multiple times at the same orchard, Thierbach, about an hour away from us. But we’ve never done berry picking there. I was afraid Don would want to choose a farm closer to us instead of making the drive but I was pleasantly surprised that he wanted to go the same place. We have just loved our experience every time, so it makes the drive worth it.
Besides our family, there were maybe only one or two other small families there. We ended up having a huge section all to ourselves. We expected to spend quite a while picking strawberries, but when you have 5 kids picking at the same time, our box filled up pretty quickly. We ended up making up a few games for the kids (things like “who can find the biggest/smallest strawberry in 30 seconds”) just to spend more time there and make that 2 hour round trip drive worth it haha. Also, I may have gone on a picture overload.
I think out of everyone, Kingston enjoyed it the most. I wish I knew how many strawberries that kid ate. Every time I saw him, he was stuffing another one in his mouth. His face and hands were stained red.
We did have one certain child who just wanted to go back to sleep. He picked strawberries for a few minutes and spent the rest of the time wishing he was in bed. I had the nerve to wake him up at 8am that morning so we could get out the door by 9. Now he knows what it feels like haha (Says the mom of sweet baby, Clementine, who has not been a very good sleeper the past few nights.)
Speaking of Clem…
Did your heart just melt? Because mine did. There was a sweet woman who was picking berries close to us and asked if we wanted a family picture. I have laughed at it so many times because the kids look absolutely miserable. But besides Kai, they all really loved it. So we’ll continue on the quest for a normal family picture.
A few days before this, I had decided to try a braided crown on Evangeline to see if I could figure it out. I had tried before and failed but I was determined to do it this time. It was a sloppy success! She has asked a couple more times for the crown (and my guess is because I let her play games on my phone while I fix her hair and she has caught on that this hair style takes the longest, haha.) It’s nowhere near perfect but I was so proud to be able to pull off a decent braid! This was only my 2nd time so be kind and don’t judge 😉
We had such a fun time and I think it’ll be our new May tradition! And I think next year I’ll make sure I’m not on Whole 30 when we go because it’s pure torture not to be eating all kinds of strawberry desserts right now. I hope you’re having a good week!
(p.s. Don has been making short little “micro-vlogs” for his instagram stories and is compiling them for YouTube videos. There’s a short snippet from strawberry picking in this video 🙂 )