Adam and Jen posted a note Sunday at church: Help! Come pick beans and I’ll give you half of what you pick! So on Monday evening, we went.

Their garden must be half an acre in size. String beans, corn, tomatoes, and I don’t know what all. The beans apparently came on too late for them to sell many at the farmer’s market, but when we got there we had never seen so many growing in one place. Many were six inches long—or better. Some were as thick as your finger. You just picked up a branch off the ground and a dozen huge beans came with it. In about an hour we had picked four large grocery bags full (paper or plastic? Paper), and Jen helped us load them into Dexter’s trunk. When we got home Jess said, “What about Jen’s half?” Oops, forgot that part.

Jess took her beans back to her yesterday morning, and Jen told her we can come out later and help pick whatever remains. Um, okay. We appreciate the way people help us out. If we ever have a garden that’s half an acre in size, we’ll reciprocate.

Shown above are the results, right after I discovered half of it had to go back. On the left are the two boxes of elderberries Jess and I picked along the highway on Saturday. On the right is Noodles the cat, investigating. The yellow thing in the middle is Jessica’s corn-shaver-offer-thing, which she lent to Jen.