June 2026: Summer Blueberries
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about summer lately, and what really makes it such a special season. I tried to capture as much as I could of the moment and feeling that make up summer to me in my summer color palette and collection (check it out here). Even though the summer feels so short in the bigger picture of the calendar year, there really is a lot to pack in, and so much to savor before the cool weather returns. Magnet club this month felt like an opportunity to stick with that theme, and a blueberry magnet felt like a perfect (and tasty) choice.
Berry picking is the best of all things summer combines: being outside in the sun, sweet treats that are at their best in this season only, adventures with friends, and so much more. I have so many fond memories of bike rides along the bike path near my house and frequent stops to pick from the blackberry brambles, sometimes with friends, sometimes with family, sometimes as a solo adventure. When I was older and lived in Portland, OR, summer meant trips out the berry farms on Sauvie Island, where it was all too easy to get carried away at the pick your own berry farms, and end up with pounds upon pounds of all sorts of berries before you realized what you’d done. Those weekends always ended in fun new baking projects, jam making attempts, and begging everyone in a 2 mile radius to PLEASE take some blueberries before they all spoiled (we did spend our hard earned money and time gathering those, and no one wanted to see them end up in the compost).
Blueberries especially bring into my mind one of the classic children’s books that stayed on a steady rotation in our household: Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey. If you haven’t read it, you should (I promise you will never truly be too old for kid’s books. They are the best). It’s the story of a little girl and her mom who head out to gather blueberries, and before too long, Sal ends up following someone else’s mom by mistake: a mama bear who was out on a similar mission with her own cub.
The making of these berry magnets was, as usual, a fun time and an opportunity to look so much more closely at blueberries and their shapes and colors than I ever had before. That’s one of the best parts of my magnet projects, the forced attention to detail that helps me notice things I would otherwise overlook. My very first test of this magnet look just like the real thing, color and all. The only thing is, the real color of blueberries is dark blue. Like, really dark blue. While it was true to life and looked good, the dark, dark color didn’t have quite the bright blue color I thought it needed to pop the way I wanted. Round two had me mixing shades of blue, white, lavender, and reds, and I ended up with a gorgeous assortment of blues. I love that not each and every blueberry magnet is the same shade, it gives it a realness that you would see when you look into your berry pail as you gather: some may be riper than others, some sweeter, some mushier, more sour, the whole range.
I will be listing my extra blueberries here in my shop, and the exact shade you get will be a surprise. But here’s a secret: If you are in magnet club, or would like to join magnet club this month, I’m sending you two berries, just so you can get the full effect. See, there are benefits to being in the club!
