I Can Not Tell A Lie

It is often, most likely, mistaught to the children of America that George Washington chopped down a cherry tree. The story is used as an example of George Washington's veracity.

I've heard the story, but what is most intriguing about the story to me is why he would chop down the tree?

When I moved into my home, I had two mystery trees in the backyard. My hope of hopes was that they were cherry trees. However, the people that examined them determined them to be magnolia or crabapple trees.

As the fates would have it, they were wrong. I have two cherry trees.

Although I did not know that I had cherry trees, every bird in the county did know about my trees. I was warned that I needed to cover the trees with nets to prevent these flying thieves (with apologies to the Bible, they didn't reap or sow) from making off with my cherries.

I purchased the requisite net and Jesse and I spent close to an hour getting it over the trees.






Victory Photo


After the nets were up, I ran a sample batch of cherries over to Shannon, my cherry expert, for a determination on whether or not they were ready for picking.

She determined that they were ready to be picked and we scheduled a cherry picking appointment. What I didn't know, was that this was also a cherry pie baking appointment.

I can not tell a lie. I didn't really participate in the pie baking, but I have since participated in the pie eating.



The Bounty



Shannon with the Bounty



Shannon removing the pits.



Cutting the lattice. It was the first time this cheese spreader had been removed from its box.



Shannon making a mess in my kitchen. Actually Shannon still owes me one mess, because I recently tracked mud into her apartment and also left a sizable mess behind when we bound calendars. So I'm up on her 2 messes to 1.



Shannon rolling out the pie crust. Both Jen and Shannon are tremendous pie crust snobs. Neither will even consider the remote possibility that a person could make a pie with anything other than crust made from scratch.



Removing the pits from cherries is a messy business.



More pit removing.



Shannon Picking Cherries



Shannon Picking Cherries



The Proud Owner of a Shannon Baked, extremely juicy Cherry Pie.


After looking at one of the pictures of Shannon picking cherries I thought it might be interesting to Photoshop that picture with one of my favorite Photoshop techniques. I thought it would look interesting due to the nets.





Now that I have officially enjoyed the fruits of my cherry trees, I know one thing for certain. If George Washington ever came over to my house and chopped down one of my cherry trees, I would lay him out. Founding Father or not.