blackberry picking

Last week Gigi was off of work Tuesday - Friday and her and Poppop joined us for several activities all week. Tuesday they came with us to our usual storytime at the library, then to the park for a picnic lunch. On Wednesday we went to the pool and then on Thursday we went blackberry picking!

This place was awesome - it was about 40 minutes from our house, out in Concord in the middle of nowhere. Without directions it would have been impossible to find. We pull up and it looked like it was just someone's house (which we were worried about because they don't have a website or anything). But then, you drive down this little dirt path that goes to the back of their land and there are the most blackberries you have ever seen. I mean, rows and rows of awesome looking blackberries in various stages of ripeness... and no thorns! I thought that Caleigh would love it because she loves picking and eating cherry tomatoes, blueberries, and picking strawberries. She was in a funk when we went and after a ladybug landed on her arm while we were walking through the rows she was pretty much done (she is terrified of all bugs). This pic below is so real life - my dad is picking berries, Caleigh is freaking out in the background about bees (there were like 2 there that day), and I am trying to smile and look cute while Andrew isn't the least bit interested in taking a picture. Blackberries are one of our kiddos' favorite foods and they ate almost every one that they picked. Blackberry in mouth... Andrew actually attempted to pick some off of the vines. At one point he crawled over to one (a red one) and tried to pull it off but because it was red and not ripe yet it didn't really want to come off of the vine. So he pulled again, no success. So he leaned over and put his mouth on it and pulled it off that way. And then after taking a bite he promptly spit it out - too sour, lesson learned! Good thing I chose old clothes and dark colors for this guy - he was a gooey mess! And when the kids got tired a picking they did a little playing. We had a blast. Gigi remarked that seeing the abundance of fruit must really be similar to heaven or like the Garden of Eden - fruit from the vine in glorious abundance. We had a great time and might actually make another trip out there this season. For dinner we had a wonderful blackberry cobbler - yum!