my god!!! Those are some really big blackberries or you have very small hands!!  in either case they look delicious!

My memories of childhood on the farm involved blueberries - smallbush - and raspberries and blackberries of the wild variety so, while they weren't large, they tasted great!  Also the cherry tree that my other grandfather cut down ... gram made a pie and everyone wanted to know if there wasn't some way to 'put it back together'

Went to visit my grandfather in Oregon after I got out of service and the blackberries on his place were huge but they were more tart than sweet ... oh, well, that was gramps as well.

I see you are putting on a little weight there but it's not so much that it looks bad.  Over half way there so you've got it made.  (( unmarried male here ... right?!?! ))

Some videos of the pups and the stroller are in order, but you've mushed, no?  that shouldn't be too much of an adjustment.

ETA: Gran'pa cut down the cherry tree when he was mowing the grass around the house with a hay mower. He was my grandmothers second husband so 'the other grandfather'

My husband pulled a granddad the other day and mowed down my old fashioned gooseberry bush. it grows by where the path I walk the dogs is and the path goes around it. For some reason it didn't dawn on him why the path made a big swoop in it and he rammed the mower right over the top of my gooseberry bush. I don't have much hope it will sprout back. If he had done it in the spring then maybe but this late in the fall I have a feeling it's toast.

I have two types of blackberries. I have thornless that get good sized but they are hit or miss on taste that do their thing in the spring. Then I have this set of extremely thorny blackberries that bear fruit in spring and fall. The spring crop doesn't usually amount to much but it will consistently wow in size and taste in the fall crop. Even when we had the horrible drought last year that dried up ever other variety of blackberry.

I have a large contingency of fruit. Blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, black currants, boysenberries, elderberries, and I HAD a gooseberry. Orchard has cherries, peaches, apples, and pears. I have figs and lemon trees in pots I bring inside during the winter. I also harvest off our american persimmons. I have a row of hazelnut bushes, as well as a couple walnuts in production and pecans going in next spring. I plan to replant my grape vines sometime. Deer put a lot of pressure on them at the old location so they couldn't get good size to produce so going to reestablish in new spot and hope for better. Some of this is still working on getting to production age. None of it was in when we moved to this house 6 years ago so everything is pretty young. Doesn't undo my aggravation every time my husband mentions moving like it's no big deal to start it all over again.

Do not know where my reply went! Jenn - you look fabulous! I'm betting that 10 pound gain will soon balloon - last trimester, if i remember correctly, starts to become a pound a week!
Those blackberries look wonderful. We had some but a woodchuck was eating them before they got really sweet. I think he's now living in my shed, will know soon, when i put the pool to bed for the winter, the shed gets totally rearranged for storage.

We have thimbleberries they are kind of like a black raspberry i guess. This is the first year ive been able to eat any of the wax currants, the birds get them before they are ripe. And the chokeberries are insanely healthy but remind me of tasteless pomegranate juice with how dry they are. Mostly nothing grows here without help.

What exactly does a gooseberry taste like. We have something called a service berry thats similar.

Anyone have any uses for rosehip berries? Ive been trying to figure out what to do with the over abundance of them.

Any ideas why my blackberry wont set fruit? It also never really gets very big. Ive tried moving it to different spots i fertilize it monthly i water it when its the dry season. Its like close to 7 years old now and ive gotten 1 berry off it. Its one of 4 plants i still have going but i never figured out why it went wrong. Also its supposed to be a thornless variety and somehow its looking more and more like a thimble berry bush being scraggly and small and covered in tiny fine thorns. I bought it as a root thing at tractor supply.

Emily, never had it, never made it but there's Those Hips jam and rose hips tea. Supposedly good source of vitamin c

What is your pruning situation on the blackberry? Does it bloom? Most cultivars grow a year and then fruit the following year so each time you've moved it you've reset a 2 year clock. Even if it doesn't set fruit though on a cane if that cane bloomed it's pretty much done and should be cut back so a new one can replace it.

@Lostmaniac if my grandmother were still around she could offer a lot of suggests re the rose hips. She had some wild roses on the farm with a bountiful production and she'd suck on one for hours ... beyond that little bit "I know nothing."

Emily - i just looked online, there are tons and tons of recipes for those hip jam and syrups. But a warning not to eat them raw.

Rose hips are ok to eat raw, they just dont have alot of flavor. Its the hairs you have to avoid. I considered attempting a wax currant/chokeberry wine and maybe infuse the rose hips but the wax currants are gone.

As for the blackberry bush i cut it back and cover it every winter. It said it was ok for zone 4 but i wonder if the number of days in the growing season is the problem. Also it wants to grow into like vines instead of a bush. Ill get a pic of it in the am.

I have also tried more sun, less sun, i fertilize it about every 3 months and change most of the soil yearly and its currently in happy frog but the year before i mixed happy frog and ocean forest.

Well, here's Kasper's first foray out with the stroller. Not eventful at all. He walked with it like a champ.



I wasn't sure what to expect since he's bike reactive. I wasn't sure if he would think he was being chased by it and want to run away from it or if he would constantly want to cut in front of it or what. If he saw something in the middle of the path he was interested in he would try to cut in front of it a little bit but the threat of being run over by it was a pretty good deterrent. the only real issue I had was once in a blue moon if he would come to a full stop or double back to check out something he thought he missed I might run over the leash with the back tire and need to unloop it, but he only did that twice on the 3 mile walk we took.

This was also our chance to check out the logistics of having to deal with getting a dog, stroller, and car seat in and out of the truck and how it would all fit. I have a new Explorer. I went back and forth on whether to step up the Expedition but decided against it. I can get all three dogs in the Ex with the car seat, but not with the stroller. Only two dogs fit with the stroller in the back. A dog or the stroller would need to come to the front seat if it all needed to go.



For the most part getting car seat out, then dog, then going to the back to get stroller worked fine. Then stroller was first in the back, followed by dog, then car seat. That may change depending on weather once there's an actual child in the car seat. I just don't want to open the back of the truck while the dog is in it because he might jump out whereas I can close the back easily enough without him trying to vacate.



I opted to leave the old dogs at home for this because I wasn't sure how Kasper was going to react and I didn't want them in the mix if he was going to freak out. Neither of them I have any worries about reacting with the stroller and they both walk too slow for conflicts with the stroller path being a factor. Every day anymore is a day longer with them around than we really expected. At least kenzi. We are amazed that she is still going. She gets around better than Kye frankly, but she is almost fully blind now and her back end is starting to have more struggles with stability. Both spend most of their time sleeping.

Kasper hiding from you is a good shot!!! Some dogs take 'foresty' pictures really well, some not so well and some leave me wondering if there's really a dog in there.

Nice pics, Jenn. I wonder if his good behavior with the stroller is some archaic understanding of traveling with a load - whenever i take the garden cart out or drag the trash can down to the road, Any falls in line with it, same with my wagon. Always seems like the husky genes at work, wanting to pull a sled!

Ya know, Jenn, circle of life. You're practicing with the stroller and dogs in anticipation of a new baby. Husband and I are practicing, too: putting my sock on, helping me up the front steps (the ground sink in from of them so it's a good 14-15 inches up the first steps.) getting me up out of the FR sofa. Teaching him how to make coffee, run washer, dryer, dishwasher. Etc, etc etc.

If rather be doing the baby stuff! Enjoy.

Perhaps. He doesn't fall in line with the bike at all and I have a reel mower that just freaks him out to no end. Garden cart doesn't seem to bother him so much but he doesn't follow it. I've not tried to hook him to it. The first time we tried to run with him he thought he was being chased and freaked out. It took a little bit to get him where I could go jogging with him. I didn't try to jog with the stroller during our test. He's also not hooked to the stroller. I just have him attached to my running belt as is normal. I need to shorten the slack line on the running belt to better prevent him from being able to walk in front of the stroller. I think I could pull about 3 inches out of it and that would be enough.

My friends threw me a surprise baby shower Saturday. I'm iffy about surprise stuff and the fact that my husband could kinda keep his mouth shut about it was surprising in itself. He's terrible at keeping secrets. Luckily I didn't show up looking like a bag lady as is sometimes possible since the plan for the day was to go to my parent's house and pick up the dresser and other baby related furniture they still had with the big truck. We are supposed to be down there next weekend for a Halloween party but will be taking the explorer and I couldn't get it all in there. The only things left to get from them now is the bookcase and the rocking chair, which will fit in the Explorer next weekend.

Kasper has to go through all the baby stuff we bring in. He would like to take each stuffed animal so that is an animal-by-animal reprimand to establish that they aren't his. For the most part if I give him the chance to try to take something and tell him no then he won't bother again, but if I never let him even sniff anything then he's worse about trying to sneak it later, so it's best to just desensitize them to stuff as it comes in. Going to start running through all the laundry to get it all smelling like us and our house. The more she smells like normal house stuff when she comes home the easier the transition will be for them I think as well.

@twisterII wondering how your ultrasound went today? Thinking of you.