Summer is officially here at the Mathews house. While Daddy continues to work–wrapping up a school year takes a few weeks–the kids and I celebrated Nate’s first day of no school with a small adventure. We packed up the van with an igloo full of drinks and picnic lunch supplies, plus the kids, and headed up to Sadler, TX, a small community between Sherman and Gainesville. We were going berry picking!

One of the benefits of living on the far edge of civilization (you know, we do have a cornfield behind our yard) is that such berry farms aren’t as far away from us as from our friends in the city :). We arrived at Bailey’s Berry Farm by 9 am and picked blackberries (blueberries aren’t quite ripe). Nate was the prize picker…he scouted bushes ahead of me and picked the hard-to-reach ones for the little guys. They each carried a small tin pail, which they would fill and then dump into my gallon bucket. The hot sun wore them out after an hour or so, but we gathered our bucketful.

We were home before 11, so we saved the picnic lunch for a park near Daddy’s school. The kids ate, played on the swings and slides, and picked pecans from the ground. If the wind hadn’t threatened to blow us away, we’d probably still be there.

Fun kickoff to summertime!