Welcome New Sisters! (click for current roster)
Merit Badge Awardees (click for latest awards)
My featured Merit Badge Awardee of the Week is … Patti White!!!
Patti White (#4415) has received a certificate of achievement in Stitching & Crafting for earning a Beginner Level Dyeing for Color Merit Badge!
“While visiting Shaker Village of Pleasant in Kentucky a year ago, I was fascinated with the weaving and dyeing that was perfected by the Shaker women. They not only used dyes from plants and insects, they also harvested and spun wool from their livestock and kept a worm farm for the purpose of making silk. In their gift shop, I purchased a book called Natural Dyes and Home Dyeing by R. Adrosko to mark my enthusiasm for trying to dye fabrics when I returned home. An excellent historical account of dyeing fabric, the book also had simple-to-follow, tried-and-true recipes. I was committed to using only plants that were growing on our property and to get a variety of colors.
I set an electric hot plate on my planting table in the garage, found an old 2-gallon pot with a lid, and set out to plan my ‘color wheel’! My fabric was 100% cotton muslin, torn into varying sizes.
Here are the recipes I used and the results:
Fabric prep mordant for berry dyes:
Prepared fabric by boiling in 8 cups water and 1/2 cup salt for 1 hour.
Thoroughly rinsed, but kept fabric wet.
Mulberry Dye: 2 cups berries – 4 cups water
Boiled and mashed. Strained through cheesecloth. Put strained dye back in pot and added 2 cups water. Added fabric to dye and boiled for 1 hour. Rinsed off in tub with garden hose and hung to dry.
Fabric prep mordant for plant dyes:
Prepared fabrics by boiling in 8 cups water and 2 cups vinegar for 1 hour. Thoroughly rinsed, but kept fabric wet.
I followed the same recipe and proportions used in the Mulberry Dye, but used these plant materials: spinach, yellow yarrow, walnut sawdust, pink rose petals, and coffee grounds from my kitchen.
I wore gloves while working with dyes and put the strained mash from each batch in my compost pile. I love the muted shades of my dyed fabrics and hope to someday make a mini quilt using just these fabrics. I presented the idea to my 4H quilting girls as an idea for a project for next year’s county fair. We’ll see!!”
Maybe you’ve heard of the phenomenon geocaching—it’s traveled far and wide. It’s been mentioned in many publications (Mom devotes an entire page to it in her Glamping book). We went geocaching as a family for the first time last weekend. Who wouldn’t love a real-life treasure hunt for folks of all ages that’s based entirely on the honor system?
It starts with a map of your current location from the official Geocaching website.
Some best friends to help navigate are always handy. And hiking shoes for a cache in the woods are a good thing. Spiderman goulashes are also helpful.
Off we went! Geocaching will give you actual coordinates for using a compass, and we’ll do that when we’re a bit older. We chose the GPS route this time and …
On a wild goose chase we ventured!
We searched high and low …
while we worked together to find the treasure …
And when we did, the kids could barely lift their bounty …
But the score was definitely worth the three-mile trek. The master rule of Geocaching is that if you want a treasure, you must leave a treasure for the next person and ALWAYS sign the guest log! We hope someone likes the mini John Deere tractor my daughter traded for paddles and a ball.
Geocaching is a wonderful adventure for family and friends. Thank you, Geocaching, for encouraging our kids to head outdoors. We’re hooked and can’t wait for our next adventure!
And the winner of the fourth of five Milk Cow Kitchen books I’m giving away …
is … 
Nancy Couden, who wrote on May 15, 2014: “My cow’s name would be Mammie. I want a Dutch Belted. My mother’s mom was Pennsylvania Dutch and we called her Mammie. I’d make buttermilk, buckwheat waffles with blueberries, bananas, walnuts, and plenty of maple syrup.” Watch for an e-mail from the farm, Nancy. Congratulations!
And the winner of the third of five Milk Cow Kitchen books I’m giving away …
is … 
Jill G., who wrote on May 15, 2014: “I would name my cow Franny, because I just met the most wonderful woman of the same name. She is 85 and she volunteers to mentor teens. And, I would drink my first cup of milk warm from the cow!” Watch for an e-mail from the farm, Jill. Congratulations!
Buy props used in MaryJane’s books and magazine!
5% of profits will benefit www.firstbook.org, a non-profit that provides new books to children from low-income families throughout the U.S. and Canada.
Here’s how:
MaryJane will post a photo and a description of a prop and its cost along with a few details as to its condition here: https://shop.maryjanesfarm.org/MaryJanesCurations. It’s a playful way to be the new owner of a little bit of farm herstory.
