A Strawberry Adventure

Today I went to a local pick-your-own farm and picked about 20 pounds of strawberries. Last year, we missed the window with the chaos of moving and getting settled in, so I was really watching the signs for strawberry picking this year. While we planted strawberries in our garden, we are not expecting to harvest any of them this year so that the roots can develop real well.

As you can see, they were absolutely beautiful and ready to be picked! Once home, we got right to work getting about 15 pounds of them processed for the winter. My beautiful daughters were eager to help and learn what needed to be done to make our wonderful strawberry jam, syrup for topping ice cream, and a few gallons frozen for making strawberry pies.

They had so much fun and the strawberries were so juicy that little Zoya looks like she was slaughtering chickens instead of slicing strawberries! Her dress was stained right through to her panties and the skin underneath all the way down to her knees! Raeann was just as busy helping, but managed to contain the stains to her forearms and hands! And, we go a lot accomplished in just a few short, busy hours.

Working together, we processed 10 half-pints of strawberry jam, 8 pints of strawberry syrup to use on our ice cream, and 2.5 gallons sliced and frozen for homemade strawberry pies. I couldn't have done it without my wonderful helpers! They did such a great job. I think we can classify this "assignment" as part of our life skills class for homeschooling for today!