Picking Blueberries with K

Before I even got married and had kids, I had set an educational goal for my future children. It happened this way:

DH was then my boyfriend, referred to as Mr Wonderful by my Dad. Mr Wonderful and I were hiking at Great Blue Hill near Quincy, when we came upon a small patch of wild blueberries. We had a container of some sort, I don’t remember why, and we filled it pretty quickly. My Mom was later able to make us a fresh berry pie. As we were picking (and stuffing our faces) a little boy running down the hill saw us, stopped in his tracks, and also stared picking berries. When his mother arrived, dressed in a sand colored pantsuit with an ’80’s bow scarf at her neck, she called out, "Gregory! We don’t eat food off (shudder) bushes!" At this point my memory gets foggy, but I think that Gregory looked sullen and stayed put, Mr Wonderful reminded him to obey his mother, and Gregory did, while both he and his mother glared at us.

I decided then and there that my children would that know that food does not just come from the grocery store in boxes.

In fairness to that lady, I’d be nervous too if my kids were hanging out with strangers and eating something I wasn’t familiar with, my rule with my kids is they have to be told which plant parts to eat first, no experimenting. But oh dear, her phrasing was unfortunate!

K mostly played in between the rows
while we picked blueberries at Dufort Farms, Last week.
But then she switched to playing "Follow M." He went through to the other side of the bushes to escape. She did try to pick also, but had trouble distinguishing between blue ones and green ones. Then she played the put things into the container, and dump them out game.

B meanwhile picked industriously, tried to avoid my camera, and challenged himself to pick more than he had while picking with Grandma.

When K tired of her game, and got loud, I declared that we had enough berries for a buckle, and to snack on as well, so we were done. B and M both wanted to keep picking, until they had filled their yogurt containers. I managed to fulfill M’s desire by pouring my berries into his. But, B has outgrown such tricks, and asked to stay behind while I picked out our grass fed beef for Sunday dinner, as we’d pay for the beef and berries at the same time. K settled down when the farm’s Black Lab came by to visit, and she saw the pretty jam jars in the new store shed.
When M told me to look in K’s mouth, I realized that she had figured out to eat the blue ones; but Mrs Dufort was understanding.