One thing that I hate about the Northwest is the blackberry vines that grow all over the place. They are a weed that I constantly have to yank out of my yard, and they poke me and make me bleed. But one thing that I love about the Northwest is the blackberry vines that grow all over the place. In August and September the berries are everywhere and we can pick them to our hearts' content. All three of our kids would live off them if I let them.
This year was a particularly good year. I got ambitious and made a couple of batches of jam. A friend happened to stop by mid-process and caught me amidst the stirring and the sweating. I also happened to have some bread baking in the oven at the time to give to our awesome neighbors for watching our house off and on this summer, and my friend accused me of going Molly Mormon on her. I told her to snap a picture because it would be a rarity.
Yesterday I took it up a notch and baked a blackberry pie. I had just watched the movie Waitress the night before, and if any of you have seen it before, you know that you can't watch that movie without craving pie. So the kids and I went out to pick berries. An hour and many scratched up arms later, we had a bowlful. Thing 3 insisted on carrying home the bowl. I gave it to him and then two steps later realized that was a bad idea. Sure enough, before I could take the bowl back, he tripped and dumped all the berries we'd picked. He looked up at us with sad eyes and said, "Sorry, guys." He was too cute to get mad at, so we picked more berries, and the pie turned out great. Not as good as Keri Russell's character would have made, I'm sure, but then again I'm not married to an angry, needy wife beater either, thank you very much.
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