Today's Picking

Yum.

Meager? Yes. Delicious? Absolutely.

Thank you, poky raspberry bushes, for allowing me to devour in 1 minute, what it took you months to grow.


Actually, truth be told, it is this guy....

who devours the majority of each day's picking.

See that bowl? I had to fight Logan off with a stick while attempting to preserve these raspberries for a picture. In a matter of seconds after taking this picture, most of those berries were gone. Logan was generous enough to share a few with Mom and Dad.

I think I love our raspberry bushes because it reminds me of my childhood. Growing up, our family (ok, let's be real... my parents) grew a huge garden each summer and right in the middle of that garden was a long row of raspberry bushes.

Every morning during raspberry season my mom would wake me up ( ahem... try to wake me up) early in the morning so I could go out and pick raspberries before the heat (and hornets) set in.

Our family had raspberry picking streamlined. We would use my dad's old black, leather belts to strap empty milk jugs (tops cut off) around our waists, allowing both hands to be free for picking. This extra hand came in handy: for lifting up leaves where the best berries were hiding, for swatting away bees and lots of daddy long legs (ew), for shoeing away earwigs that got picked along with the berries, for picking our noses... ok, maybe not.

My sister would pick on one side of the raspberry row and I would take the other and we would see who could get done first, who could fill their bucket first. Fun times. Fun conversations.

I love raspberries.

Thanks Mom and Dad for growing raspberries and teaching us how to work, even if it meant being around bees, bugs and waking up (somewhat) early. :-)