Ok, I am sorry, but I have to go back to the culinary delights again…the occasion is just too good. Because today, while the little one and I were working in the garden, we discovered that the strawberries are having a second season. Which caused the little one to be absolutely joyous and to break out into loud laughter (priceless, I tell you!).

You see, ever since we returned from Finland she has discovered that “garden” basically means “food”. It started with a very early strawberry season this year. The little one could not even walk, but she crawled into the strawberry bed as soon as I put her down. She ate dozens of strawberries, including green ones and almost alcoholic ones as she was simply too quick to be stopped.

As soon as the last strawberries were gone, she discovered (by herself!) that there’s something called raspberries. At that point she was able to stand and she spend most of the time in the garden holding on to the small fence around the raspberries with one hand while picking and eating them with the other. I trained her only to eat the red ones. However, I was not able to stop her from eating some additional protein. One time I was on the phone with my friend who needed some serious cheering up. I saw the little one picking a raspberry with a stink bug sitting on it and shouted “Little one, NO!”. Since the little one knows that she only has a split second after that dreaded word, she reacted as fast as she could and the next second both stink bug and raspberry were gone. I still shiver in disgust when I think about swallowing a living bug, and I don’t even want to think about the taste, but the little one didn’t care at all.

Well, after the raspberry season we visited my parents where she ate her way around the garden…starting with apples, then white currants, ending with black currants (which she absolutely loved).

Back in Switzerland, she discovered the blackberries in the garden (again without me showing them to her) and since she was able to walk, that’s where she headed right after entering the garden. It’s also where she stayed for most of the time, looking like a little vampire afterwards. At one point during the last weeks we discovered that the blackberries as well as the raspberries are affected by fruit flies (I really don’t want to know how much protein the little one ate during the last weeks!). So unfortunately the berries had to go and we sincerely hope that it’ll be better again next year. But much to the delight of the little one a garden does not only offer fruits but also vegetables…whenever we wanted to make cucumber salad for dinner, we only had half of the cucumber left because the little one would take the freshly picked cucumber, walk behind the little tomato hut of our neighbours and start eating…

In Ticino we had ripe pear trees on the terrace and guess what? Pears became the major food for the little one. First thing in the morning: oh happiness and joy, pears fell down over night!!! If we didn’t hear anything from her for a while we knew she was sitting on the stairs munching a pear.

And now: strawberries again! It’s heaven!! But tell me, what is she supposed to eat during winter??