Winter 2014 has proven to be a hard one! With over three feet of snow covering the yard, ice everywhere, and everyone, including the chickens stuck indoors, how do we keep from going stir crazy?
Nicole Christensen 
Rae 
Rebecca 
Laurie Dimino 
Joan 
Torben bagh 
Beverly Battaglia 
JULIE 
Lisa H 
Adrienne 
Debra 
Terri 
Ulla Christensen 
Debbie Brozanic 
Kimberly Komar 
Doreenlee 
Claudia 
Karen Crabtree 
Maureen 
nameTina Stopa 
CR LaGroue 
Barb 
Nancy Bender 
Judy Lockhart 
Meredith 
Bonnie Ellis 
Mel 
Sharon 
Mary 
Naomi 
Denise Ross 
Alice - Farmgirl #12 
Mary Rauch 
Beth 
Denise S 
Jan 
Heather 
Chris 
Patti 
Anne 
Rose 
Julie 
Holly 
Dinah 
Cathy H. 
Catherine Blount -
Debbie 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.’”
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.
Cathi 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.”
Dori 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.
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.”
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!
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”.
Hi Nicole,
It has been a LONG and BRUTAL winter for sure. Where I live in northern Indiana, Lake Michigan can “enhance” our snow production and definitely influences our weather. My daughter has missed 8 days of school this winter and it looks like the majority of those days will have to be made up this summer. Thankfully, the brutal cold (-25 to -45) has moved on and hopefully not to return. Monday we had another fierce snowstorm but yesterday the temperatures finally warmed higher than freezing and we were getting some snow melt. Now the worry is flooding. We are expecting a LOT of rain and thunderstorms tomorrow. There is almost three feet of snow on the ground and the ground is froze a good three feet. There is no where for the water to go. It will be an interesting and anxiety filled few days, especially for those that live in flood plain areas. Sometimes I wonder what we would talk about if we didn’t have the weather. Ha ha ha.
Despite all the snow, I see the beginnings of Spring and that brings hope that one day soon we will relish the sight of green grass and green leaves. I hear the birds singing once again and some are starting their courting dances. Can you feel the warmth of the sun and the warm breeze on your face? Can you smell the fresh cut grass? Won’t it be exciting to be able to open our windows once again and let the fresh air overwhelm our senses? The smell of the earth as we begin our spring planting can’t be beat. I can’t wait to hang my sheets out on the line, too. Just think, if we didn’t have the winter, we wouldn’t have anything to look forward to and that makes me more sad than getting stuck inside with all the snow.
Lisa
Hi Lisa, I love your attitude! I could almost smell that green grass reading your comment! You are so right, won’t spring and summer be an even more appreciated gift this year after all this cold? I hope the flooding doesn’t cause too much trouble. I wonder the same thing…where is all the water going to go? Thank you for commenting, warm thoughts and farmgirl hugs your way. -Nicole
Yum now im hungry for muffins! Ill need to get the husband baker on that !!! 🙂 wish we had raspberries !! We only had a frozen overstock of blueberries 🙂
Hi Rae! Blueberries will work, too. I love blueberries, but last year the ones I put in did not produce. Hopefully I will have some this year! -Farmgirl Hugs, Nicole
Wow! Your post reminds me of the day when I had a weekend/holiday cabin in the mountains of southern California. We had some pretty deep snow in the winter and fortunately, the A-frame was on stilts with a creek flowing down the hill to the highway below. The cabin had a 100-gallon propane tank half buried in the ground and provided heat, cooking/baking, and the Swedish fireplace as well as refrigeration (Italian refrigerator ran on propane). It was great to snuggle under a quilt sipping tea and eating soup while listening to the snow fall. Snow whispers, I decided. Now that I live in San Francisco and hoping for more rain to end our drought, I’m wishing for snow in the mountains by Lake Tahoe, Donner Pass and other areas not only for the skiers but those of us who need full reservoirs when the snow melts in the spring. And spring will be here soon!
Hi Adrienne! The cabin trip sounds wonderful, and peaceful. I like how you call falling snow “snow whispers”. That captures it exactly. Right now, though, we’ve had ice and freezing rain, too, and that is difficult to deal with. I have a cousin in California, and she was just telling me about the drought. It’s hard to imagine a drought with all the excess moisture we have here. Wish we could send some of this precipitation there! Thanks for visiting me, Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
Our Ozark winter here in Missouri has been quite the winter, lots of snow, ice,
below zero wind chills, a true winter.
I’ve walked my gardens every morning though, quilted, baked on my old cookstove,
written long letters in my journal, and simmered wonderful soups!
This is the first year I’ve noticed the birds singing on the below zero mornings and they are already making their nests for spring, so early and so cold, but how inspiring to hear them sing their songs before dawn and so chilly, a true mother’s love!
This morning Im taking used plastic yogurt cups and starting marigold seeds to be ready to plant after the frost, I use the blossoms for teas and salves.
Happiness! Diana, Noel, Mo
Hi Diana! Sounds like a lovely time at your neck of the woods…quilting, baking on a cook stove! I can’t wait until we thaw a bit so I can walk around my gardens, too. Right now, they are completely buried, ha ha. I am going to start my seeds, too. That always makes me feel like we are just rounding the corner and winter will be done soon. Your comment has reminded me to put out my nesting materials for the birds! Thank you..Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
Hi Nicole,
Loved your post as I can relate to it all being your “neighbor across the sound” here on Long Island. Literally, kids being home from school, chicken woes, plenty of snow, pouring over seed catalogs and making gardening plans, wow…..we REALLY have to meet in person! I feel like your a long lost “sister” !
Stay warm and safe, and keep your chin up, Spring really IS just around the corner!
Hugs,
Laurie
Hi Laurie, I feel the exact same! I can’t wait to meet you, either. What fun we will have! Hang in there, farmsis, we’ve got to start thawing out soon! Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
The Minnesota winter has been brutal. The snow is very deep, I too wonder where the water will go. Yesterday and today we had temps up to 40 degrees, we opened all the doors and windows and let in fresh air! What a treat. Tomorrow another blizzard and after that below zero temps again. But winter for me is doing long neglected things like cabinet cleaning, decluttering etc. we remodeled our kitchen, hubby is replacing all the doors and woodwork now. New carpeting to follow. We are at our lake place most of the summer, so winter is time to catch up. Due to school closings we were pressed into daycare service for our 7 and 5 year old grandsons, so time to catch up on hugs and kisses as well. Soon it will pass and we will fishing and boating once again.
Hi Sandy! I have a pen pal and my husband has a good friend who are both in parts of Minnesota. Brrr! But like a true-blue farmgirl, it sounds as if you are making the best of a long, cold winter, and how awesome you get some “bonus” days with your grandkids, too! Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
The snow at your place is beautiful! I’m from South Georgia and we had one night of flurries! Not much accumulation! Just enough that my children could make a hand sized snowball each to put in the freezer!! For me, that was plenty! It has been very cold here this winter. For us, a nice change from the scorching hot summers! We’ve had a lot of ice. More than we’ve had in years! More rain too! We have been in a drought for some time now! Anyway our children DO NOT do well having to be in doors AT ALL!! Lol!! We spend a lot of time outside! We farm, bale hay, fish, hunt and play! So when we have to be inside we build forts, work on school projects(we homeschool), read a lot, etc. We’d love to have enough snow to build a snowman! Maybe one winter we will!
I really enjoyed reading your post and the ones who replied! I also love the “farmgirl” connection that we all share! I’ll be praying for everyone’s safety during all this snow and ice! And can’t wait to read more of your future posts!
Blessings to you and yours!
~Kim~
Hi Kim! Thank you so much…it makes me happy to hear you liked my post. My mom is in Georgia, too. I can’t believe all the ice and cold you all have had this year. Up here in the north, we do have to be “creative” sometimes with activities with our kids since we sometimes just can’t get outside as much as we’d like, but come spring through early winter, we are outside as much as possible, at least my family is. I really don’t mind the snow, and generally will walk the dog and get out in it as long as the temps don’t dip below about twenty degrees or so. We love to make snowmen, and sledding is fun. Ice, though, is difficult, and we’ve got so much snow, it’s too much of a good thing! Today we have bright sunshine…I’ve got all the curtains thrown back and the dog and cats are sunbathing in sunny spots. Think warm thoughts, and thanks again for “visiting” me! Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
Hi Nicole! We have always loved Kansas winters here. We have a sledding hill that is open to everyone around here and they know that they can come and sled when it snows. I love the coziness of staying inside in front of a roaring fireplace. I love long walks in the snow in the woods that surround our cabin. I am enjoying the rest from all the outside work and gardening I do every day of the Spring, Summer and Fall seasons. The beauty of Winter is just amazing and I never liked it until my awesome husband gave me a new perspective on the wonder of it all. So many people have a bad attitude about Winter, but it is all in how you view something. Thanks for sharing, I enjoyed your post.
Hi Cat! I agree…winter gives me a much-needed break from weeding and gardening. I’ve grown to really love and appreciate four seasons. Your cabin sounds wonderful. Love that you have a great sledding hill and offer to others. Sounds like you have true farmgirl spirit. Thanks for writing in. Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
Dear Nicole,
Loved your post as it brought back wonderful memories of living in Michigan and the “north country” of New York. The picture of your daughter peeking out of the snow tunnel brought back memories of my daughter(now 32 yrs old) and the snow tunnel she built, the snow fell on her middle trapping her and I was inside the house. I finally heard her calling and came out to her legs waving up and down on one end and her arms waving on the other. After I got her inside and warmed up we were able to laugh about it, your picture brought a great big smile to my face! Hope you keep warm and continue writing, love to read your posts!
Thank you
Marcia
(living in Florida now, miss winter very much)
Hi Marcia! What a cute story about your daughter! I bet she was a sight! If you’d like a chuckle, head over to my blog post from last February, when we got a huge blizzard. There’s a picture of my daughter, arms and legs splayed out, after she fell face down in the snow. Splat! I just had to snap a picture. We still laugh about it. That post is here: http://www.farmgirlbloggers.com/1184#more-1184
Yesterday was sunny skies until last night, when it changed to freezing rain. Today it’s warmed up a bit, it’s fifty shades of grey, and I don’t mean the book! It’s foggy, slushy, drippy, and just grey! I got to visit your lovely state last September, so today I’m missing Florida! Thanks so much for sharing, and hope you will “drop by” again! Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
Hi from Republic, Missouri. We are ready for spring around here too. I love your chicken story. I want chickens but we live in a old commercial building that was once the community doctor’s office. The city code on having chickens states their coop must be 80 feet from property line. LOL…that means our coop would be in the center of the street! After reading your chicken coop in the garage comments, I started thinking on ways to train them to a leash and teach them to bark. Oh well. I do have space for my garden and we enjoy the uniqueness of our home. My brother teases me about my kitchen being converted from the doctors laboratory. LOL!! My husband has promised me chickens one day. In the mean time I sure enjoy reading about yours. Thank you for sharing.
Merrit
Hi Merrit! I hear ya on the chickens. I suffered from what I called “chicken envy” for the longest time…even blogged about my want of chickens here a time or two. Since they are my “first” chickens, it’s been an adventure, for sure. I’m so thankful for my friend Susan down the road. She is my go-to girl when I have a “chicken emergency”, and there’s been a couple times I’ve called her in a panic. We’ll see how it all goes…I’m sure I’ll be updating the chicken status here again. 😉
Your home sounds so neat! My husband and I both like homes that aren’t “cookie cutter” designs. I’d say my home is not a “traditional” style home, either, but more a “soft contemporary”, that I’ve decorated with things I love, and lots of “farmgirl” touches! When I was in middle school in Houston, down the street was also an old doctor’s office that had been converted to a house. It was one of the neatest houses I’d ever seen, and I always wanted to know what it looked like inside. That was eons ago, and I still remember that house! Thanks for sharing with me! Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
I think most of us have had more than our share of snow and cold this winter. During last week’s storms, a lot of my southern relatives had pictures posted on facebook showing their children making and eating snow cream. That brought back all sorts of childhood memories for me, so I had to make some of my own. Of course, it’s not nearly the same when you use skim milk and stevia. Ha. It’s traditionally with lots of real sugar, vanilla and heavy cream. I love the snow, but I have to admit that I’m beginning to look for some signs of spring. Your pictures are beautiful and so peaceful looking.
Hi Rebecca, I have yet to make “snow cream” with my daughter! Now most of the snow is so hard and dirty. It stays pretty until about this time in February, when all the salt and slush is grey, ya know. But you’ve inspired me…the next fresh, pretty snowfall, we will try it! Thanks for “visiting” me! Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
Chickens love all kinds of greens BUT please don’t feed them white potato skins. They have been treated with something toxic and will kill your chickens.
That’s true. I don’t give them any white potato skins, but sweet potato skins are just fine. Good tip, thanks for posting. Farmgirl hugs, Nicole
Hi Nicole:
I was your husband’s VW dealership today and he asked me about my Mary Janes Farmgirl decal on my car. He gave me your blog address. Just wanted to say hello and loved your blog on the chickens. Keep the home and country going. Mary Janes Farm is my favorite magazine!
Irene
Hi Irene,
Kim told me there was a farmgirl at the dealership! He said you have chickens, too. Thanks for reading and for saying “Hi”. I am glad you enjoy the blog, and all things MaryJane! Farmgirl Hugs, Nicole
Hi Nicole, I love your recipes and the quilted runner. Thanks for those
I live in CT and was looking for a Farmgirl Chapter and was wondering were you are. I live in Oakville in Lower Litchfield county. I would like to find a Chapter to share fun and ideas with.
Thanks Carol
Hi Carol, Thank you…I am glad you enjoy the blog. I will email you privately regarding the Farmgirl Chapter. If mine is too far for you, maybe there is one nearer. We’ll talk. Thanks for reading and commenting! Farmgirl Hugs, Nicole