Blueberry Picking and Making Memories

Issa’s favorite food right now are blueberries, which she excitedly calls “boo-bees”. So when Bill and I woke up Saturday morning I looked at him and said “lets go picking, blueberries or blackberries?” There wasn’t much to discuss, blueberries it was.

So we got ready and headed out to Moorhead’s Blueberry Farm in Conroe, TX. Moorhead’s has been around since the  70’s and it’s over 20 acres of over 20 different varieties of blueberries. All this variety means they ripen at different times so there’s a steady supply of pick your own blueberries in north Houston throughout the summer.

The opportunity to teach Issa, hands on, about her favorite fruit had me smiling ear to ear. She’s such a little sponge these days, soaking up so much information and learning how to do all sorts of things. I dream of having our own land one day with chickens and huge gardens. But for now I am so thankful for my two 5’x5′ raised beds that are loaded with herbs, tomatoes and cucumbers right now, ready to pick in just a few weeks. I want her to understand where her food comes from, and make good food choices and eat clean. So until we can grow our own blueberries or clementines or whatever else I’ll teach her by going to other local farms like Moorhead’s or Matt’s Family Orchard or Gramen Farms or Atkinson Farms, which I’ve written about before here and here.

Once Issa learned that the bushes around us were covered with blueberries she was thrilled. Bill taught her the difference between the blue, red and white ones and that the blue ones were the only ones that were good for eating. We told her how the sun and water help feed the pants and without it they would die. She was soaking up every moment and eating quite a few blueberries in the process. Moorhead’s is free of pesticides so I felt really good letting her eat them right from the bushes.

The map above shows all the places people have come from to pick blueberries there. They also sell honey from their beehives on the farm. I’m a sucker for local honey. We only picked for a little over an hour and even with lots of “Issa don’t eat the berries on the ground” and “You have to leave the white and red ones on the bush for them to get ripe” (since she couldn’t eat them she would pick them and toss them on the ground) we still picked 4.5 lbs. At $2.50 a pound you just can’t beat it, even in the heat. And the bushes are tall enough in some areas to provide a decent amount of shade. After purusing the local canned goods and grabbing a ice only snow cone we headed home. It was a fun day and a really great summer memory. If you live in the area I highly suggest checking out Moorhead’s Blueberry Farm.