The weather was beautiful (if a little windy) and it is strawberry season around here, so I took the boys to go pick strawberries.
Well, I took Aiden to go pick strawberries. Apparently, I took Connor to teach him not to pick the green ones.
Aiden already knew not to pick the green ones because of a discussion we had about my tomato plant last week. I had scolded them for picking the ripe tomatoes before we were ready to eat them. (This is mostly because they use them as small flying objects, rather than food). So when I saw Aiden come up on the deck with a couple of green tomatoes, I said, in exasperation, “Didn’t I tell you not to pick the tomatoes?!”
To which he responded, “I’m not picking the ripe ones! I’m only picking the green ones!”
So this is how Aiden got a little education on the nature of nature and how things ripen. But I digress.
This is the beautiful strawberry patch, buffered from those strong Iowa winds by a nice grove of trees. We hopped on a cart at the main store and they drove us out to our field. We were given a basket and assigned a row. The instructions were to start at the pin flag, and wherever we stopped, move the pin flag to that point. I was shocked at how many strawberries we picked (and by “we” I mean “me”) in such a short space.
After several mishaps (between picking the green ones and accidentally tromping on the ripe ones like a bull in a china shop, he was a hot mess of strawberry mutilation), Connor became the designated putter-of-already-picked-strawberries-into-the-basket. When Connor decided to raid my purse and help himself to a snack, Aiden took over basket duties.
This is our haul. You know how those strawberries you get in the grocery store are kind of tough? These berries are so delicate they practically melt in your mouth when you eat them. After a ride back to the main store they were weighed and priced. The boys convinced me I needed to buy them a strawberry doughnut, and then after a quick snack outside, a visit to their farm animals (they had goats, cows, pigs, and sheep) we were back on the road for the 45 minute drive home.
