Welcome New Sisters! (click for current roster)
Merit Badge Awardees (click for latest awards)
My featured Merit Badge Awardee of the Week is … Emily Moore!!!
Emily Moore (E-Moore, #6770) has received a certificate of achievement in Each Other for earning a Beginner Level Little Squirts Merit Badge!
“On my first official day of Christmas break, I wanted to start it off right—to earn my first Sisterhood Merit Badge!
I started my day around the house armed with a can of WD-40. I sprayed all the hinges and doors that squeaked. I researched online how to winterize garden tools, and when it warmed up a little, I headed outside to grab all my garden tools from under the house. I scraped off all the dirt and rust with steel wool, put vegetable oil on all metal parts and linseed oil on wooden handles. We don’t own any bikes, so I headed to the barn, grabbed our grease gun, and got to work. I greased all the grease fittings on the bush hog, manure spreader, and hay rake.
This was the first time I had ever taken the time to winterize my garden tools and I am really happy with the results! I look forward to making this a yearly thing. My grandma gave us a pointed hoe for our wedding, and I would like to keep it in good condition for the rest of my life—now I know how to do it.”
WINNER SELECTED, 2/22/16
And our winner is … Brenda Wheeler (see winner’s post here).
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Who doesn’t love to hang laundry on the line? Crisp, white linens softly swaying in the breeze, capturing the smell of a summer’s day. Merely a daydream on a day like today: mid-winter, temperature gauge barely above freezing, a frozen clothesline covered in snow. Spring is still down the road a ways, but you’ll be ready to hang your cares out to dry if you’re the lucky winner of this beautiful cotton clothespin bag.
Give a big farmgirl welcome to Jeannie Jessup (The Clothespin Queen), another new Project F.A.R.M. (First-class American Rural Made) business member. From the heart of Texas, Jeannie stitches up unique, durable, and wonderfully utilitarian clothespin bags just like the one your grandmother used. To win this beautiful, bejeweled, rose-patterned bag, simply tell me your favorite old-fashioned laundry tip in the comments below. We’ll put your name in a hat and draw a lucky winner soon. Stay tuned!
See more of Jeannie’s clothespin bags on her Etsy site.
First-foot: [furst-foo t] Scot.
noun: the first person to cross the threshold of a house on New Year’s Day.
In Scotland, the first person to enter your house after midnight on New Year’s Eve is called a “first-foot” or “first-footer.” And if that person is tall, dark, and handsome …
well, lucky you … in more ways than one!
Tristan and Isolde with the Potion by John William Waterhouse via Wikimedia Commons
That tall, handsome, dark-haired man is thought to bring you good fortune for the year ahead. And even more good fortune if he knows to bring along a silver coin (good luck); bread (prosperity), salt (good eats), or whiskey (good cheer).
Who was your first-footer? I think my sure-footed tom cat, Jasper Tomkins, was my first-footer.
The adorable, always humorous MBA Jane is my way of honoring our Sisterhood Merit Badge program, now with 6,760 dues-paying members who have earned an amazing number of merit badges so far—9,508 total! Take it away, MBA Jane!!! ~MaryJane
Wondering who I am? I’m Merit Badge Awardee Jane (MBA Jane for short). In my former life …
For this week’s Each Other/Farmgirl Gratitude Expert Level Merit Badge, I expressed my very own Farmgirl Gratitude, open-letter style.
I wanted to hold up some large pieces of white paper with poetical and important words in permanent marker, or maybe pour some ice on my head or something, but I figured, hey, a good, old-fashioned letter is the way to go, Jo.
No drama here.
(Never said that before.)
An Open Letter to My Favorite Things
(Singing to the tune of These Are A Few of My Favorite Things optional. But encouraged.)
Moonbeams on gardens, and ice cream with peaches,
Sweet tea with cookies, and good books in niches,
Upcycled shopping bags filled with what life brings,
These are a few of my favorite things.
Tractors as rust art, upcycled porch swing,
Organic and homemade and garden-grown everything,
Fresh air while hiking and glamping while camping,
These are a few of my favorite samplings.
When the health’s good,
When the air’s clean,
When I’m planting trees …
I simply remember my favorite things …
And then my farm life’s a breeze!
Okay, maybe I haven’t earned my Expert Level Merit Badge in Poetical Poetry, but hey, I got ya singing, didn’t I? And don’t even pretend you weren’t channeling Maria and spinning in a circle, be honest. von Trapp it up.
Now pass me my sweet tea (local honey, of course; it’s the bee’s knees), put up your feet on my upcycled porch swing, and pen your own open letter of gratitude. Your heart will thank me.
Ooh, I like this one …
If you’re not situated in the snowiest place on earth,
then you may be wondering where—and when—it’s going to snow.
Let me gaze into my crystal snow globe …
Photo by David J Laporte via Flickr
What do I see?
I’ll admit I’ve taken a shine to weather watching (my hubby’s fascination has rubbed off, it seems). I even offer a Farmgirl Sisterhood Merit Badge for Weather.
And, yes, I do love a good snow.
So, according to Snow-Forecast.com, my neck of the woods may get some flurries soon.
How about yours?
photo by Thduke via Wikimedia Commons
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.
