I had fun coming up with these YURT reverse acronyms: Young Urban-Rural Tourist. Yes, Unless Really Tired (this was a close second to the final title). Yucky Underwear Rides Tightly. You’re an Uber Radical Teacher. I chose “You Understand Rare Treats” because of how much I have come to appreciate what many people take for granted.
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Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
”
~ Mark TwainDebbie Bosworth
is a certified farmgirl at heart. She’s happily married to her beach bum Yankee husband of 20 years. She went from career gal to being a creative homeschooling mom for two of her biggest blessings and hasn’t looked back since. Debbie left her lifelong home in the high desert of Northern Nevada 10 years ago and washed up on the shore of America’s hometown, Plymouth, MA, where she and her family are now firmly planted. They spend part of each summer in a tiny, off–grid beach cottage named “The Sea Horse.”
“I found a piece of my farmgirl heart when I discovered MaryJanesFarm. Suddenly, everything I loved just made more sense! I enjoy unwinding at the beach, writing, gardening, and turning yard-sale furniture into ‘Painted Ladies’ I’m passionate about living a creative life and encouraging others to ‘make each day their masterpiece.’”
Column contents © Deb Bosworth. All rights reserved.
Being a farmgirl is not
about where you live,
but how you live.Rebekah Teal
is a “MaryJane Farmgirl” who lives in a large metropolitan area. She is a lawyer who has worked in both criminal defense and prosecution. She has been a judge, a business woman and a stay-at-home mom. In addition to her law degree, she has a Masters of Theological Studies.
“Mustering up the courage to do the things you dream about,” she says, “is the essence of being a MaryJane Farmgirl.” Learning to live more organically and closer to nature is Rebekah’s current pursuit. She finds strength and encouragement through MaryJane’s writings, life, and products. And MaryJane’s Farmgirl Connection provides her a wealth of knowledge from true-blue farmgirls.
Column contents © Rebekah Teal. All rights reserved.
“
Keep close to Nature’s heart … and break clear away once in awhile to climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods, to wash your spirit clean.
”
~ John MuirCathi Belcher
an old-fashioned farmgirl with a pioneer spirit, lives in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. As a “lifelong learner” in the “Live-Free-or-Die” state, she fiercely values self-reliance, independence, freedom, and fresh mountain air. Married to her childhood sweetheart of 40+ years (a few of them “uphill climbs”), she’s had plenty of time to reinvent herself. From museum curator, restaurant owner, homeschool mom/conference speaker, to post-and-beam house builder and entrepreneur, she’s also a multi-media artist, with an obsession for off-grid living and alternative housing. Cathi owns and operates a 32-room mountain lodge. Her specialty has evolved to include “hermit hospitality” at her rustic cabin in the mountains, where she offers weekend workshops of special interest to women.
“Mountains speak to my soul, and farming is an important part of my heritage. I want to pass on my love of these things to others through my writing. Living in the mountains has its own particular challenges, but I delight in turning them into opportunities from which we can all learn and grow.”
Column contents © Cathi Belcher. All rights reserved.
“
Wherever you go, no matter the weather, always bring your own sunshine.
”
~ Anthony J. D’AngeloDori Troutman
Dori Troutman is the daughter of second generation cattle ranchers in New Mexico. She grew up working and playing on the ranch that her grandparents homesteaded in 1928. That ranch, with the old adobe home, is still in the family today. Dori and her husband always yearned for a ranch of their own. That dream came true when they retired to the beautiful green rolling hills of Tennessee. Truly a cattleman’s paradise!
Dori loves all things farmgirl and actually has known no other life but that. She loves to cook, craft, garden, and help with any and all things on their cattle farm.
Column contents © Dori Troutman. All rights reserved.
Shery Jespersen
Previous Ranch Farmgirl,
Oct 2009 – Nov 2013Wyoming cattle rancher and outpost writer (rider), shares the “view from her saddle.” Shery is a leather and lace cowgirl-farmgirl who’s been horse-crazy all of her life. Her other interests include “junktiques,” arts and crafts, glamping, collecting antique china, and cultivating mirth.
Mary Murray
describes herself as a goat charmer, chicken whisperer, bee maven, and farmers’ market baker renovating an 1864 farmhouse on an Ohio farm. With a degree in Design, Mary says small-town auctions and country road barn sales "always make my heart skip a beat thinking about what I could create or design out of what I’ve seen.”
Rooted in the countryside, she likes simple things and old ways … gardening, preserving the harvest, cooking, baking, and all things home. While you might find her selling baked goods from the farm’s milkhouse, teaching herself to play the fiddle, or sprucing up a vintage camper named Maizy, you will always find her in an apron!
Mary says, “I’m happiest with the simple country pleasures … an old farmhouse, too many animals, a crackling fire, books to read, and the sound of laughter … these make life just perfect.”
Column contents © Mary Murray. All rights reserved.
Farmgirl
is a condition
of the heart.Alexandra Wilson
is a budding rural farmgirl living in Palmer, the agricultural seat of Alaska. Alex is a graduate student at Alaska Pacific University pursuing an M.S. in Outdoor and Environmental Education. She lives and works on the university’s 700 acre environmental education center, Spring Creek Farm. When Alex has time outside of school, she loves to rock climb, repurpose found objects, cross-country ski on the hay fields, travel, practice yoga, and cook with new-fangled ingredients.
Alex grew up near the Twin Cities and went to college in Madison, Wisconsin—both places where perfectly painted barns and rolling green farmland are just a short drive away. After college, she taught at a rural middle school in South Korea where she biked past verdant rice paddies and old women selling home-grown produce from sidewalk stoops. She was introduced to MaryJanesFarm after returning, and found in it what she’d been searching for—a group of incredible women living their lives in ways that benefit their families, their communities, and the greater environment. What an amazing group of farmgirls to be a part of!
Column contents © Alexandra Wilson. All rights reserved.
Libbie Zenger
Previous Rural Farmgirl,
June 2010 – Jan 2012Libbie’s a small town farmgirl who lives in the high-desert Sevier Valley of Central Utah on a 140-year-old farm with her husband and two darling little farmboys—as well as 30 ewes; 60 new little lambs; a handful of rams; a lovely milk cow, Evelynn; an old horse, Doc; two dogs; a bunch o’ chickens; and two kitties.
René Groom
Previous Rural Farmgirl,
April 2009 – May 2010René lives in Washington state’s wine country. She grew up in the dry-land wheat fields of E. Washington, where learning to drive the family truck and tractors, and “snipe hunting,” were rites of passage. She has dirt under her nails and in her veins. In true farmgirl fashion, there is no place on Earth she would rather be than on the farm.
Farmgirl spirit can take root anywhere—dirt or no dirt.
Nicole Christensen
Suburban Farmgirl Nicole Christensen calls herself a “vintage enthusiast”. Born and raised in Texas, she has lived most of her life in the picturesque New England suburbs of Connecticut, just a stone’s throw from New York State. An Advanced Master Gardener, she has gardened since childhood, in several states and across numerous planting zones. In addition, she teaches knitting classes, loves to preserve, and raises backyard chickens.
Married over thirty years to her Danish-born sweetheart, Nicole has worked in various fields, been a world-traveler, an entrepreneur and a homemaker, but considers being mom to her now-adult daughter her greatest accomplishment. Loving all things creative, Nicole considers her life’s motto to be “Bloom where you are planted”.
Column contents © Nicole Christensen. All rights reserved.
Paula Spencer
Previous Suburban Farmgirl,
October 2009 – October 2010Paula is a mom of four and a journalist who’s partial to writing about common sense and women’s interests. She’s lived in five great farm states (Michigan, Iowa, New York, Tennessee, and now North Carolina), though never on a farm. She’s nevertheless inordinately fond of heirloom tomatoes, fine stitching, early mornings, and making pies. And sock monkeys.
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Archives
What a story. I felt as if I were sitting outside your yurt drinking tea listening to you. Can not wait to hear iof your adventure on moving.
Patsy.
Thanks, Patsy! I would have invited you in, for it is getting cooooollllldd out there!
Gosh that’s quite an adaption to prepare for. I would say the simplicity of living where you are right now, living in your yurt, though hard would be amazing.
I think you’ll do well in the city bwcause you have great mindset and value system. You might even teach your new neighbours a thing or tow.
All the best with your move and be kind to yourself
Hugs from the land down under (Australia )
Denise x
Thanks, Denise!
The hardest part will be maintaining that simple lifestyle that you’ve developed and loved. I couldn’t care less about a dishwasher, but a washer, dryer, and clothesline are awesome things. 🙂 And you have your partner to help keep things simple – you are both on the same page. I don’t have that, my husband is a sit-in-front-of-the-tv-and-eat-junk-food guy, while I’m in the garden, working on crafts, climbing mountains, and going to work at a stressful job every day. It is a balancing act, and I think your young years spent in a simple life will really be the learning experience you needed it to be!
Thanks, Susabelle. I think so, too!
You Understand Rural Treasures
Perfect!
It has been interesting, educational, and fun following Your Uplifting and Rewarding Triumphs, not to mention trials and tribulations. I look forward to your future posts!
Good one, Barb!
Alex, I read this post with a catch in my throat. The yurt has been and is a special home for you and Evan and Ava. It is an experience you will have with you forever and you should feel very proud of the amazing home you have made in the AK woods.
All my life I have enjoyed all the amenities you mentioned in your post but I haven’t experienced a house plant living for more than a year.
Love , Mom
I know for a fact that a couple of your plants have been around for awhile! You made me tear up again, in a good way of course. Love you.
Alex, one adventure comes to a close and, yet, the excitement of what is to come is very evident in your words. New routines, more comfort/convenience items, more time to appreciate the now, making new friends, adding your footprint to your new community and just plain investigation of new environs. Oh my, how I wish I were young again and could walk with you on this new path. Enjoy every minute, even the more testy ones. I’ve had a life time of good and not so good adventures and I hoard their memories like gold. Blessings to you and yours.
Thank you, Barbara! I will try to enjoy it all, even the testy times 🙂
Maybe some day you can have both: the “good stuff, like dishwashers” and a rural, peaceful life. I live in the woods in WV and it’s wonderful!
That is the hope, Karen! Looking forward to that time, but also enjoying the intermediate steps along the way. I am excited to live in a city (as much of a city as Anchorage is anyhow…), because I don’t expect we will do much city living in future moves. I forgot to mention that we will be within walking distance of so many things: parks, trails, a big museum, bakeries, a small grocery, farmer’s markets, a community garden and Evan’s work!
Aw! We went from rural ranch living to town to tiny tourist town to the mountains. Every place has really had it’s own trials and tribulations and it’s own blessings and special people. Enjoy every step of the way and hopefully someday you have the opportunity to move back to the woods… There’s no place quite as serene in my mind ;-).
I agree, Trish! Living in the woods is the best.
Hi Alex,
Awww…. I’m gonna miss the Yurt! 🙂
I can relate just a tiny bit as we lived in our travel trailer for 2 years while we were building our house. It was so much fun for the first year… and then it just got worse and worse! By the time we moved out, we never wanted to step foot in that travel trailer again. Seriously. We cleaned that thing up and had it sold within a month!
So I’m curious about what will happen to the Yurt. Is it staying in your friend’s yard? Or is it something that can be “put away” and sold?
I’m excited for you. It’s a new adventure and you’ll love it. And I really, really do hope you’ll make paper and send me a snail mail note!
I also think you’ll make a great Rural Farmgirl in the city. Anchorage is kind of a one of a kind city anyway.
Big hugs and great excitement for you!
– Dori –
P.S. Ava’s farmgirl friend is sure gonna miss you.
I will miss the yurt, too! We will be selling the yurt soon, but we don’t know if we’ll be taking it down now or in the spring (I vote the spring! However, I think hubby wants to get it moved along sooner…I think it will snow in the next week or two, so we’ll see). If we sell it now and the buyers want it ASAP we’ll take it down, otherwise it will stay up over the winter and our friends can use it if they want to. We also thought about leasing it to some college students or something similar, but the right match hasn’t arisen.
We will love this new adventure! I know we will; but it’s hard to leave a place when it has just started to feel like a good fit, you know?
On to Anchorage–“a city built by people who don’t like cities.”
And yes, you are right, Ava’s farmgirl friend is NOT happy with our move…she has been protesting it all summer. We have many protesters, which is actually a great feeling–makes it harder to move on though. I have promised some slumber parties in the future!
Strangely enough, this desert girl has been to Alaska (albeit via a famous/infamous Inland Cruise ship), and I’ve visited and walked the streets of Juneau, but not Anchorage… Hate to tell you this, but you’re still gonna be in the boonies… Way North!!!
Look forward to hearing more of you adventures…
Haha, yes Lynn, you are right. We will still be in the boonies compared to many places! It’s the biggest city for many, many miles around though 🙂
My older daughter lives in anchorage She is nurse at hospital there. Name Peggy Watson
what are you doing with the yurt? will you sell it? is there a market for such things? i am very curious 🙂 also , i have been house-sitting for the last year but do not have a contract at this time. i am technically homeless even though i am able to stay a few nights at a time at friends homes until another situation is found. i have chosen this way of living to deal with the fact that my income does not provide for the paying of rent. i am 63 years old and the lack of permanence is very difficult for me sometimes.i have moved 16 times in the last 20 years. i am very fortunate to have a large portion of gypsy in my personality which makes it tolerable. 🙂 i also find a lot to be thankful for in the simple blessings of life and especially when considering the sad situations of so many others in the world. Here in the USA we have so much more than anywhere else. i hope you enjoy many wonderful blessings in your new home…
Thank you, PJ! We will be selling the yurt. We have potential buyers right now, but we probably won’t know if they really want it until after the holidays. It would be nice to keep it, but transporting it from place to place right now when we don’t know where we’ll end up isn’t very feasible. Moving frequently is hard! I’m impressed that you continue to do it. I like that–you have a bit of gypsy in you!