Once upon a time there was a family that built a log cabin in the woods. They were happy to live in the woods, but missed having an apple orchard and cherry bushes like they did in their old farmhouse. So, the mom of the family called the county extension office because she had heard that they had trees and bushes for sale very cheaply!

And they did! Only 25¢ each! So the mom ordered a bunch of cherry bushes and eagerly awaited their arrival in the spring.

The bushes came, only they were not bushes. They were little sticks. Little one-foot high sticks with tiny bare roots sticking out them. The mom felt very silly, but she dutifully planted the sticks and dutifully watered and babied them through seven years of drought.

The sticks grew little by little, but didn’t do much. They had tiny leaves and every spring they would flower with pretty pink flowers, but alas, no cherries.

Then one year the drought ended. There was a spring of rain! Glorious rain that awakened most every plant in the woods and beyond. However, the mom had forgotten about her cherry bushes. She had given them up as a lost cause.

Then one day one of the children came in from playing on her swing. “Mommy!” she said. “There are cherries on our bushes.”

The mom was skeptical, but decided to go and look to humor her youngster who would not leave her alone. Imagine her surprise when she saw limb after limb of big, fat ripe cherries! There were cherries everywhere!

She quickly set her little daughters to picking cherries. Soon the little daughters were kicking themselves for even mentioning that there were cherries on the bushes. They picked and picked and picked. They fought off birds and bees who also wanted the cherries. Then they sat at the kitchen table and pitted and pitted and pitted.

The mom busied herself making cherry preserves with the fruits of their labors. 30 half-pints of cherry preserves to be exact. The mom was pretty sick of cherries by the time she was done.

The End.

Except — that is the best darn cherry preserves we have ever tasted! Bar none!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008 at 2:36 pm and is filed under Eggs in Tomatoes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.