Strawberry Picking

Mmmm.....berries! One of my favorite things of summer is berries, and I am especially glad that we have passed this love of fruit on to my sons. Today we went to the Thompson Farms u-pick. I was not sure how the boys would do as Evan is a bit of a destructor. They did surprisingly well. They picked berries the whole time, except for the last few minutes Evan found a stick and was poking stuff. Eli was very meticulous, of course, and had to remove every stem and all of the leaves from his. Evan only picked a few "pink" ones, but fortunately no green ones. We ended up picking 21 1/2 pounds of strawberries. We brought them home, cleaned them, got the leaves off, and prepared them for freezing. We left some whole ones for eating, sliced some that we are currently drying for snacks, left some out for ice-cream, yogurt, and whatever toppings, some out for a pie that I made (yummy!), and the rest we sliced and juiced to freeze, which ended up being about 20 cups. We should be good for awhile, at least until the boys devour the whole berries in the fridge! Next, perhaps raspberries, my personal favorite!