Down at the farm

On Friday, I was home with the kids, and I took them out to Park's for our annual blueberry-picking trip. Now that we are 'south siders' we are actually a lot closer to Pardo's Berrie Farm, but (a) I dislike the fact that they misspell the word Berry. And (b) Park's, to me, will always be the original and the best.

At Pardo's, they don't have a blue wagon pulled by a blue tractor to take you out into the field. They don't have rubber duck races for the kids. They don't have that wonderful bake shop and store where I can't leave without buying something. And they don't have the "How tall this year" sign to measure our growth:After we got home and I pulled up our photos on the computer, I showed Liam the photos from last year and the year before. The year before that, we didn't make it to Park's, and the year before that, we did go, but they didn't have the sign back then. 

2008:

Liam about died laughing when he saw this oldie-but-goodie from 2007:

I thought that was kind of funny, because he really didn't look any different the first time he went:

As usual, Liam ate and ate until he was completely stuffed, and he made hardly any contribution to the 10.6 pounds of berries we left with (thank goodness we were there at the peak of the season this year, and accumulating that much fruit did not take us long to do!) By complete and utter contrast, Mallory happily picked berries for an hour but refused to sample them the entire time. She would not even eat one. I swear, her fruit and vegetable aversion is getting worse by the day. It is definitely a texture thing for her. A few weeks ago I was trying to get some peaches into her mouth, and she would have none of it. At one point I actually forced a piece in and she spit it out and said, "That doesn't feel very good." I don't think she has any problem with the taste of these things, just the way they feel in her mouth.

She's on vitamins. I think I am fighting a losing battle.