Strawberry Picking

It is strawberry picking season again and we headed off to our favorite Russell Orchards in Ipswich for their Strawberry Festival.

We climbed on board and took the hayride which brought us straight to the strawberry fields.

See the flower that Clara has picked for herself again?

Off we went strawberry picking...

We have been strawberry picking almost every year that we have been here and this year's harvest has been the best!

We got 3 quarts of strawberries altogether. When Clara fussed while we were still picking, I gave her a strawberry to keep her busy but she just wanted more and more!

After we were done picking the strawberries, we took the hayride back to the farmhouse to pay for the strawberries.

See Clara still happily eating the strawberries?

"More?" said Clara, pointing to the containers of juicy strawberries right in front of her. I said to Justin the strawberry fields must have felt like paradise to her! Strawberries everywhere!

I don't know what the three of them were reacting to in the photo below :)

Can you tell Clara has been eating strawberries?

There were other activities like live music, wine tasting, etc. Sonya tried face-painting.

We ran into Eva, Sonya's friend from preschool, and her family.

The both of them got their faces painted together.

This guy asked if he could take Sonya's photo and Justin said yes.

Here are the painted faces of Sonya and Eva :)

After that, we went driving around while Sonya and Clara had their afternoon naps. When they woke up, we had arrived at the Plum Island National Wildlife Refuge and Plum Island State Park.

These beautiful wildflowers were growing everywhere, even in the carpark area! Justin was very impressed with one that sprouted out from a crack in the road.

Here are the rest of the flowers that I found blooming around the island.

We climbed up one of the Observation Tower to see the area around us. We didn't really see many wildlife, except for a few ducks, cranes, seagulls and other species of birds that I do not recognize.

This is the view of the Atlantic Ocean...

These are the views of the wetlands on the other side.

Down the tower we came and on to the beach.

Most of the beach is closed from April to late August as it is the breeding ground for piping plover, a shorebird species threatened with extinction.

But there was still enough of beach to get Sonya and Clara very excited.

Near the tip of Plum Island, rocks and boulders took over the sandy beach. There were quite a few people fishing there. It was low tide and some people were looking around the rocks and boulders in search of something. We suspected shellfish but we might be wrong.

Clara and Sonya just couldn't keep their hands off the sand and they both got very sandy.

One of Clara's shoe is always popping off. Sure enough, it popped off many times and here is Justin cleaning her foot and wearing the shoe back for her.

Clara showed off the tiny rock that she found :)

It was getting late and time for dinner.

Clara was quite reluctant to go. Everytime I hurried her and she ran, her shoe popped off again!

Clara found a seashell and used it to "cut" the sand. Sonya found a stick and started digging.

After cleaning all our shoes of as much sand as possible, Sonya and Clara looked at each other before we headed back to the car.

Another fun adventure that we just stumbled upon :)