On Father’s Day we went to church in the morning, then headed home and took a nap.

We thought we might go visit a park in the late afternoon but couldn’t find a likely prospect in our area. There’s not much out here. Then I had a thought – why not go blueberry hunting? We’d spotted quite a few bushes around our land, so we decided to make an afternoon of it. After getting up from a nap, it was time for coffee and blueberry hunting.

There are a few types of wild blueberries and wild blueberry relatives in our acid, pine-dominated soil. The best of them all is the “rabbiteye” blueberry, which is beautiful and easy to spot.

Aren’t they lovely? Like little pearls.

If you have pines in the woods, there’s a good chance you have blueberries nearby.

Rachel picked quite a few berries, feeding many of them to our voracious little 1-year-old daughter, who absolutely loves blueberries.

Multiple children came along and picked, some for the basket, and some to eat fresh.

My eldest daughter is a pro at wild food foraging already.

She spent four years hunting the Caribbean jungles for water lemons, mangoes, skin-ups and passionfruit. Now she’s hunting chanterelles, blueberries, blackberries and other more temperate delights. She was the one that spotted the first fruiting wild muscadines we’ve seen on our property.

Soon we’ll have grapes! Maybe we can forage a bunch and make wild muscadine jam again, like we did in North Florida.

We weren’t the only creatures interested in eating wild blueberries, though. The kids also spotted multiple groups of these attractive fellows:

They hung out in strange configurations at the end of blueberry branches, graciously holding still to have their pictures taken.

Speaking of taking pictures, all these shots were taken with my Canon 80D, using a 50mm lens. That lens takes amazing portrait shots, but also does pleasant close-ups. It’s a steal. I’ve even used it for some of my videography. For example, the entire biochar grinder video I shot the other day used the 50mm lens. The step-by-step build portion looked really beautiful.

I can’t think of a better way to spend Father’s Day than going for a walk with the children and picking berries. I am blessed. Though my dad is gone now, I am doing my best to walk in his footsteps and enjoy the moments of fellowship God gives us together.

Hope you all had a good Father’s Day, too. God bless you dads out there. Press on!