Blueberry picking with the 'rents

Yes, I'm woefully behind, nothing new there. I've decided to stay in WA for awhile and have been spending a lot of time with the family. I've been enjoying my time with them.

Before I left OR I went blueberry picking with Linda's parents. They are a hoot! I am proud to say I made it to their house with only one wrong turn. We drove a little south to go pick the blueberries and they gave me a tour of where they used to live. Back in the day they used to farm. Actually, the place where we were going to pick wasn't one of those u-pick places, it's actually a commercial blueberry farm and they're friends of the family. We were getting to pick a few days before the machines were going thru.

While talking to the owners of the farm a falcon went thru. Apparently, they had such a problem with starlings that they hired a falconer to come in during berry season to patrol the fields and keep the birds away. I thought that was pretty cool. I guess wineries do that a lot.

They took us out to the fields that had the most berries ready to pick. Since they knew I was a novice (as dad T would say, a berry picker in training) their words of advice was to handle the berries like I was milking a cow (he qualified that with, not that you have ever milked a cow, does it show?). You grab the berries by a bunch and just sort of twist them around in your hand. They literally just fall into the buckets that we carried around. Look at the beautiful berries. There were just rows and rows of them. I was proud at how fast I was going until dad T had a full bucket way before me. Then when I went to dump my bucket I saw why he was so fast, there were green berries in there as well as leaves whereas mine and mom T's were beautifully picked buckets. We chitchatted the whole time we were picking. It was a lot of fun. Since I was a woman on a mission I only stopped to eat the berries when I was walking back to the car to dump my blueberries. I'd munch on a handful then (not ones from the bucket, saved those for later). We all picked about 3 buckets worth. I think we were probably out there an hour and a half. I actually got my hands dirty! I had to take a pic of that momentous occasion, LOL. I used my water bottle to rinse off one hand. I needed to apply lip balm *G*.

Afterwards we went to a mongolian grill. Mom loves it, I wasn't blown away. The highlight was the soft serve ice cream at the end. Both mom and I are fans.

You'd think the work would be done by now but that's when it really began. Because the majority of the berries would be used for syrup we had to go thru and clean out all the berries. Remember the leaves and green berries? Yep! We went thru sinkfuls cleaning them out. And by we, I mean not dad. He was "working" in the other room. I was still planning on trying to leave for WA that night so I left around 5pm. There were still more blueberries to sort but I had to hit the road, plus I was pooped! I felt bad because mom was still full of energy. She's in her 80s and has a bad hip! She could probably out run me, LOL.

Once I hit the road I realized by the time I got home and had my nap it would be too late to head out and since I was too tired to nap, it was a good call. Of course I took home with me several large ziplock bags full of blueberries of which I took some to WA with me. Talk about yummie goodness. Of course I let everyone know I worked the fields for those blueberries, LOL.

I hear grape picking is much easier. I'll try and keep up!

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About Leiha

I love to eat and sleep. One thing is more fun to blog about than the other. In between eating and sleeping I love to travel, spend time with my family and talk about myself. :)