It’s strawberry season!

I’m excited.  The lack of exclamation points might make it seem as if I’m not all that excited but I am.  The strawberries are ready for picking at Hilgert’s Farm.  Or you can go to the market and buy already picked berries if you’re not up to picking your own.  M and I stopped by the market yesterday to buy a quart to sample.  I’ll be joining a friend on Wednesday to do some picking.  I’d like to freeze a bunch of them this year.

The reason strawberry season excites me so much is because it is the beginning of the fresh, locally grown, produce season.  The peas and sugar snap peas will be coming in next.  Some of the other farmer’s markets have lettuces, green onions, radishes, and fresh herbs that are locally grown.  From now until sometime in November we’ll be eating plenty of fresh fruit and veggies.

(Lunch!)

We also went to the Hartville Marketplace to see what was available there.  As usual, we loaded up on lots of goodies such as red leaf lettuce, radishes, green onions, and new potatoes.  We came home and made a lunch that was a feast of mostly locally grown vegetables and fruit (with a few not-local nuts thrown in for good measure).

The rains continue, almost unabated.  I’m beginning to feel as though we live in a rain forest during the monsoon season.  Everything is lush and green and beautiful.  And wet.  The pond is filling up nicely.  We decided to raise the water level this year to see if that helps with the weed and algae control.

The rain has also brought something that the birds are attracted to and that something is on our deck.  I don’t know what it is.  There were dozens of birds pecking around on the deck and under the porch, seemingly enjoying whatever it was they were feasting on.  Bugs of some kind, perhaps.  Or seeds from the trees.  I’m not sure.  Whatever it is/was, it gave me the opportunity to practice with the zoom on the new camera.  Most of the photos were pretty bad.  I got lucky with one or two fairly decent shots.

The flamingos are an easy shot since all they do is stand there.  They don’t seem to mind the rain although they might be swimming or floating soon if the pond gets much higher.