A wonderfully heart-warming and inspiring story for sure and for certain. One of my hooking friends was talking about a friend of hers who had redone and “glamped up” a vintage camper and then parted with it. I should check with her – perhaps they are one and the same. Maizy is a wonder and I hope you and your family enjoy her fully and completely in the years to come and is the home of many happy memories for you.

I enjoyed your “glamper” story! Super cute too!

We had a pickup camper and tried to retro the inside but husband used it for a hunting camper as well as our family camper. Dreams that needed to change but new ones came in their place.

You did a great job decorating it, so sweet looks going.

I want a large pantry so bad. I need it and yet, there is literally no room in this home for one. We only have three small closets, one in each bedroom. UGH!

I’ve had all kinds of pantries over the years. We were a family of nine and lived an hour away from a big grocery store, so it was imperative to have food storage. There was a small room off the kitchen that served us well. In those days I ground wheat and made bread. The grinder sounded like a jet engine and it was nice to be able to shut the door. In one of our houses the pantry was under the stairs. Now, as empty nesters, we live out in the country again. There is a long utility room off the kitchen. We have a washer and dryer and laundry sink on one side with the water heater at the end corner. On the opposite side is a long set of upper cabinets with tall open shelves in the middle where I store large canning jars full of dry goods and pretty baskets for extra canning stuff, paper goods etc. My buckets of wheat, oatmeal and dog food stand under the upper cabinets. There is room to hang clothes from the dryer and we have hooks for jackets right by the door to the outside carport. We have a deep freezer right outside that door. This house was built in 1970 and full of dark paneling. It took us 4 coats of white pant to transform our pantry. Now I love it! The idea is one can use spaces for multi purposes.

Never enough storage space! Our country home is only 35 years old and I wish I had included a pantry in the planning. I use the basement for our extra freezer and have shelves there for canned goods, empty jars, extra paper goods, etc. I lack enough room in my kitchen to store every thing I need. I turned the closet that is in the hall near the kitchen to a mini pantry. I purchased a metal rolling rack with 5 wire shelves. It’s used for crock pots, air fryer. waffle iron, food processor and things that don’t fit in my kitchen cupboards. The closet is still large enough to hold some coats and cleaning supplies in one end. Outdoor wear and boots are in the built-on garage. Unfortunately you don’t have that option, but I’m convinced that you’re going to come with something clever!

I have what I call “pantry envy”, as there is no pantry in this house at all. At least, not yet. What a timely post. I am at the moment, planning on taking one of the walls of our office, which is open to the kitchen, and turning it into a recessed pantry with IKEA cabinets. The only other spot we have to create one is inside the laundry closet down the hall from the kitchen, which is not ideal. The funny thing is, my son had the exact same idea about putting the pantry in the office without me even saying anything. It must be the right place! I will be placing my wheat berry buckets along with all of the other foodstuffs we have. I love the idea of the screen doors, but haven’t yet decided on that. I agree with you, that pantries are a symbol of sufficiency, independence and abundance in our lives. I can’t wait to see your new space! Blessings…

Glad you’re making it happen! I’ve wanted a pantry for YEARS and the dream is finally happening. We stole 5′ from our huge main floor bathroom (not sure what the previous owners were thinking – a bathroom 17′ wide??) to create a dedicated pantry right next to the kitchen. We’re nearly done with the walls & ceiling, next will be paint and wallpaper, then finally building out the shelves. I hope to have it functional by early spring.

It’s always a treat to read your posts. You certainly have your work cut out for you just getting through the frigid weather! Glad you are taking the time to appreciate the slowing down at this time of year. If you are anything like me, (and I think you are), the winter weather is all the encouragement I need to stay inside with a cozy fire going and tackle some indoor projects. Right now I’m reorganizing every part of our home, and loving every minute!
Praying the pipes are tucked in warm and toasty for the winter.
Enjoy the season and all of its gifts. Blessings…

Any news on when the magazine subscription will be made again

Hi Mary, It’s very cool that you do hearth cooking! In New England, we are hunkering down, here, too. The wind this winter has been awful, as well. I suspect it is from the trees that were cleared down a few years back for cows that new neighbors have. I love the cows, but the “wind tunnel” is often scary sounding when that winter air gets blowing. On a side note…I LOVE THAT DOORKNOB! Stay warm and cozy! Farmgirl Hugs, Nicole, Suburban Farmgirl

Mary, Your articles are so inspiring and wonderful! I love reading about all the things you do. Happy New Year to you and yours. Hope this year is truly a good one for you and your family. Looking forward to your next blog.

Merry Christmas Sweet Mary…. Another beautiful post – you never disappoint. What a comforting (albeit budget-stretching) thought to be having a new furnace installed ahead of the for-sure-and-for-certain cold this winter will (and already has!) brought. After my nightmare last year with the non-working furnace issues, I’ll vow I will never take for granted again being able to wake up to – or come home to – heat. Great ideas for keeping Christmas in our hearts. As I just commented on Jacky’s (“Dicky Bird’s”) post, though, I won’t be doing much baking/cooking this year even though that has always been a large part of Christmas for me. The whole GF thing makes it difficult and the kids really don’t eat much of that stuff anyway (sometimes I question whether they’re proper relation to me LOL). Gifts, too, are simpler (why buy things they don’t want/need?) but I’ve probably decorated even more than I have in the last several years. No one other than me to enjoy them but enjoy them I do…a little light in the dark of winter (and a great way of procrastinating less enjoyable tasks). Again I find myself wishing we were closer neighbors.

Thank you so much Mary for another wonderful post. I have been on bed rest for the past month after a surgery. So I am really behind. But, I need to go slow and enjoy every minute of the Christmas season. If I do not get everything finished well that’s okay. There’s always next year.
Merry Christmas and. happy New Year.
Debbie
Farmgirl #1582

Thank you for a dose of Christmas cheer! May you and yours have a wonderful holiday season!

I enjoyed reading your comments!

Greetings Mary-
Again a wonderful post, thank you! I recently noticed a bumper sticker that read ‘live simply so others can simply live.’ Simplicity and supporting local businesses as much as possible is my new focus. Two little towns over has a new wonderful Farmgirl style florist. A spectacular addition to the new roadside stands that opened this summer. Recently visited the shop with a friend. She pointed out a vintage cake stand she loved but didn’t purchase. I just forwarded your post and suggested she go back and buy the cake stand!!!

Thank you for sharing your pie recipe!

Wishing you and your family a Thanksgiving full of love and wonderful memories.

Gae
Farmgirl 7534

Thank you for your thoughts. Very important stuff—how we live.

I wrote a comment and lost it! My theme this year is simply and natural using what I have not purchasing new🎄😊🌺

Such a beautiful post, and a timely reminder.
I try to keep things as simple as possible. There are enough complications in life without me adding to them 🙂

‘Tis a gift to be simple…truly and well said. Unfortunately, being “simple” can be one of the most difficult things to achieve. I guess that’s why it’s such a gift when achieved. I believe there are so many different “levels” of simple. Many could look at my world and declare it “simple”…yet the “busyness” in my mind begs for me to disagree – and vehemently so. It’s hibernation season here in Nod, so I will turn even a bit more inward. The “winter chores,” however lurk and, in many ways, I feel like I am just trading one kind of “busyness’ for another. I do believe that “simpleness” is more of a journey than a destination…and I have miles and miles to go.

I love all of your sceneries, Displays, Just EVERYTHING!
I would love to have your recipe for that cherry pie, it looks Delicious!
Thank you for sharing.

Your magazine is so refreshing always.Thanks for bringing me back to my little ‘farm girl’ growing up years, as I’m 91 now. The true use of ‘waste not, want not’ & ‘make do’ as I remember. Blessings to You!

Autumn is looking beautiful in your part of the world. It’s a lovely time of year. Xx

Mary,
October is my absolute favorite month of the year too! You and I live in the same state of the Midwest and I’ve often wondered just how far apart we are. I love to see when they harvest the cornfields and then all the birds that come for the pickin’s.
Love your quilts and pumpkins and look forward to seeing Maizy sometime.
Until next time,
Denise
FG #43

This are beautiful flowers. I love this time of the year. So many colors, The temperature
is just right. Thank you for sharing.

Mary-
I also love Fall. I have pumpkins and orange cone flowers mixed together in the garden now. The baskets you have recently found, and are enjoying, look to be Longaberger. I have both and, as a quilter, I have fabric in my picnic basket! The chicken coop is beautiful. Always enjoy your posts.

I love the mason jars for toting picnic fare! I used to pre-prep snacks for my kids/grandkids by using a pint mason jar and some individual applesauce cups that I had washed out. I put pretzels or fruit or veggies in the jar and then the “dip” went on the applesauce cups which fit right on top of the jars. Put a lid on it and put on the fridge! Great especially for snack items that would get soggy and also easy for the kids to dip without having to reach into the bottom of the jar. 😉

Another fantabulous post Miss Mary! This one, once again, touches my heart and soul so closely…. Not because I go on many “adventure roads” (that happens totally unintentionally…) but because I’ve had a bad case of “barn-heart” since I was small – and it always breaks my heart seeing one being torn down. But none hurt as much as when the current owners of our family farm took our barn down. Knowing it was built by my great grandfather and his brothers and remembering the time I spent inside its worn walls kept warm by nothing other than the animals within, all came flooding back in a wave that threatened to take me down. I had asked for the old door handle and latch but did not get it. 🙁 Anyways…I digress. You certainly found a wonderful variety of great barns. My favorites are always those with the cupolas and “extra” details and those old, old, ones (like the ones of your black-and-white photos). They are so painfully beautiful in such a bittersweet way. ~Robin~ (PS….It has to be a 1957 Aqua Nomad?? Wouldn’t a 1955 deep burgundy one do???)

Wonderful buildings.
Barns here are usually a lot smaller and built of stone. Many get converted into houses. X

Oh what a beautiful way to start my day! I’m 81 years young and grew up playing in barns and dearly love them. So many of them here in the Midwest are being replaced by steel buildings and it breaks my “barn-heart”. Barns speak of the past without words, of a time when America was young and men were building her future with wooden beams. When I step into an old barn I always feel like I’m in a cathedral, a holy place and it touches my soul. Thank you for this wonderful post.

After a bad start to my day, I found your blog so uplifting and enjoyable !

Dear Mary, thank you for this lovely post. I grew up in the mid 1950’s with my grandparents on a farm in upstate NY.
My grandfather purchased the property from a former dairy;Aldrich Farms. In addition to a beautiful house there was a 100 year old magnificent barn that became a playground and sanctuary for me and my brother. It also housed our beloved chicken flock,our many Black Angus,and of course our pigs. I can still hear the piglets squealing when the country vet gave them shots.
Many years have passed and the barn fell when it was 160 years old. I copied your pic of the hand hewn beams and post & beam joints and forward to my brother who still lives there.Our barn had been constructed in the same manner. I will be visiting my brother next month.There will be many barn conversations.And while the land where the barn once stood is vacant it will live forever in our hearts.
Thank you for embracing history,old barns,old ways,etc. I think of the many hands and hearts, the hard work,passion and determination that created these structures and treasured items.Blessings of gratitude to them and the gifts they left behind.

I love this article and so timely! Unfortunately I lost my beloved very old wooden barn to a barn fire this February. We’ve just finished rebuilding the shiny, sparkly new (metal) barn and I do love it – but also very much miss (and grieve!) my lost barn. I saved the door handle on a piece of wood that was on the main slider door (charred and all) … and will be placing it in the new barn which I’m calling Mariah (the place in the Bible where bitter water was turned into sweet water by throwing in the Tree) – my reminder to keep Jesus in all of my life and He turns my bitter (lost barn) into sweet (new barn). God is so good! Oh also, my last name is Barnhart ❤️. Thank you for the beautiful article!

Beautiful post and photos. I have a collection of barn photos and my honey knows when we drive by an old barn that his job is to slow down so I can get a good look and a pic. I hadn’t heard the term barn heart and it perfectly fits the way it feels to love them.

Growing up in the northeast, “knee high by the 4th of July was an important saying for our corn crops. With a shorter growing season we had to get it planted as soon as was safe to be able get the corn to that growth on time. Hoping the weather cooperated.

I too have collected many aprons over the years. It seems as though I always wear the same select few. I like the idea of turning the towels into aprons. I wear mine full so would probably change the idea up a little to make it that way. So many possibilities. Thanks for the inspiration!
I have grandma’s recipes and my mom’s. I have used them to make all sorts of pickled items including bread and butters. Love them. It’s such a blessing to carry on the traditions!

Ahhh…Pickling!! It is a memory permanently etched in my head. My family loved pickles…of any kind (but mostly the dill sliced or whole variety). I did NOT like pickling season as my job was to help pick the cucumbers and then clean the the cucumbers. I would sit on the step of an old cement foundation that held the topper to my father’s old pick-up truck (which he didn’t use in the summer because he needed it to haul things (i.e., hay, etc.) with a bucket of water, a bucket of cucumbers, and scrub all the “nubbies” off. I think maybe that is why I decided I didn’t like pickles LOL. Everyone in my family LOVED pickles…and it is a trait that must be embedded in the family’s genetic code somewhere as my son would prefer them to candy any day growing up…and my grand is the same way. And while my mother wasn’t a big apron-wearer (she was a full-fledged partner in the farm duties), she certainly had 1001 “old sayings.” I could write not just a novel, but a series of novels. 😉

I love your enthusiasm. I am 91 years old. Lost my dear husband last November. Life is so lonely w/o him. Your magazine is such a comfort, especially niw. I frew up on a small farm in southern MO—memories! Thank You, Ms Martha

My family looks forward to going to the beach more which is minutes from us. It is my happy and peaceful place.
We also enjoy the farmers market, festivals and junking anything outdoors.
Oh how I love summer but for me it is always too short. So we will enjoy it while we can.
Happy Summer everyone.