Huckleberries

Growing up, huckleberry picking was as much a part of summer as swimming. Since we have moved east it hasn't been the same. There are supposed to be huckleberries in this area, but I have yet to find them in these forests. I drug my friends out into the woods last week. After driving an hour and a half, we busted out of the van only to find four shriveled huckleberries and a whole lot of empty bushes. I'm not sure if everyone in the area beat us to the patch, or if we were just too late, either way it was a big bummer.

This weekend is my seventeenth wedding anniversary, I'll have to post about that later, but we took the kids to grandma and grandpa's for a couple of days. While we were there Dad and I took the big kids out to the woods. We had some great picking. Dad had scouted out a patch and it was great. We picked for a couple of hours in the morning. The weather was perfect, not too hot, with a bit of sun. The woods hummed with bugs, but they minded their own business, and I minded mine. We came out of the woods with four gallons of berries. That is $160 worth of berries at the local farmer's market. They are all going into my freezer, except for the ones I'm giving to my friends as a peace offering for dragging them up to the woods for nothing.

I will have a year's worth of these to tide me over until next year. I hope next year the patch is at least half as good as this year. The last two years have been pretty bad even in Washington. Now my summer can end fulfilled.