We’re keeping pretty busy now that high season has arrived. I haven’t slept this hard in a long time. Not even the heat can keep me awake! Here’s a taste of what’s happening:

Now that my best friend CJ has moved back to Minneapolis, she’s been roping us into all kinds of adventures, such as gleaning mulberries. I’ve never even tasted a mulberry before, but we found ourselves in the back of CJ’s apartment building, shaking a mulberry tree and getting VERY stained and messy. It was great fun and in the end we had about 6 half-pint jars filled with thick, dark purple mulberry syrup. Mulberries are a bit like blackberries, but more bland. We added some sugar to sweeten them up while they cooked.

Can you identify this flower? I planted it three years ago; it was labeled turtlehead in the Minnesota natives section at Bachmann’s. It is clearly not turtlehead (chelone glabra). It’s pretty though, and I’ve seen pollinator activity around it, so hopefully it’s at least a native.

UPDATE: My friends at Minnesota Wildflowers helped me identify this as Great St. John’s Wort. Not turtlehead, but still a Minnesota Native, so, I’ll take it.

Our currant bush is laden with fruit right now, and our first harvest this week gave us just enough to make currant pie. So good.

My front yard garden has reached jungle status, but a beautiful jungle of pink lilies, purple coneflowers, white cilantro blossoms and yellow heads of dill everywhere.

Over in the vegetable garden we’re still playing a waiting game—we’re now 3 weeks behind last year! We finally picked a couple of tomatoes that had just started to blush yesterday, but it will take them several days to fully ripen on the counter (this is our anti-squirrel strategy). The rest we just have to patiently watch. We have picked a couple of cucumbers and a jalapeno or two now.

Today I took the day off so the whole family (including Half Pint) could go blueberry picking in Wisconsin bluff country. Gorgeous day, and we got a really nice haul. Now off to help Adam make a blueberry pie…