I challenge not. All that you have written would be on my list. But I would add the fresh smell that comes in on my dog or grandchildren after running around in the crisp air. Odd I know but it is a smell I remember.

Wool…..I love the smell of wool (and a bit of cedar oil to keep the pesky moths away) as I unpack our blankets, shirts, pants, socks and sweaters. Winter is upon us up here in the Northwoods of Wisconsin. After a little airing of their packed away arms, legs, toes and folds, I can’t wait to make up the beds in their winter garb. None of that light downy stuff for us. Then, we’re ready to snuggle under the weight of those warm wooly blankets with a steaming cup of tea or hot chocolate to hold and inhale for just a moment and a thick hardcover book. Ahhhhhhh……life is good.

I loved your article. There are so many great smells this time of year. Personally the smell of the leaves on the ground is wonderful and brings back warm memories of walking to school in the fall leaves. A delicious pot of simmering soup and a crackling fire in the fireplace are also favorite smells. This is the perfect time of year for little sparkling candles that have seasonal pumpkin fragrance. Of course the Thanksgiving turkey and the mellow smell of pumpkin pie are favorites. It is a deliously fragrant time of year. Thank YOU for sharing.

Mulled cider–the smell of cider and spice as they are being warmed on the gas stove is wonderful. Oh, and my mom’s Oatmeal Raisen cookies, fresh out of the oven–Yum!

hi,I always did say perm solution was just like manure,it smelt like money,I do love cinnimon and spice and try to smell my home up with it all over in the fall I usually purchase a cinnimon broom from the local dollor store also,with other fall smells.I had daddy saw me up a bunch of cedar limbs and I tied them up with sage green netting and ribbon to hang in the closet,we had a wonderful day,and I loved the smell of fresh cut hay and I love new baled hay.A real farmgirl,carol branum,lamar mo.

I raise angora goats and I love the smell of freshly shorn mohair. It ushers in the season of Spring and Fall for us. It is so warm, shiny and has an unmistakable smell of lanolin. It smells GREAT!!

My Michigan fall smell living in the "thumb" surronded by farms and Orchards I love the smell of mug of hot cider on a cool crisp fall day or hot chocolate. I have fall sounds too, the sounds of the tractors havesting sugar beets, or navy beans or corn makes one know it is fall as they rush to get it all harvested. Seeing the deer coats go from a reddish brown to the brown they are in the winter…and dodging them when they run out in front of your car…makes one heart beat real fast…lol

theyre rly good scones

We use the Cinderella pumpkins for our cooking needs. I clean the pumpkin, poke it a few times and put it into a pan to collect the juices. Depending on the amount of time I have I either roast it or microwave until the pumpkin is nicely cooked. I usually end up using the pumpkin meat for curried pumpkin soup, but I might just have to try your recipe for the scones.

Sure enjoyed reading your seasonal news! I have never made pumpkin puree either — and now that our kids are grown and there’s just the two of us, I’m not sure I will! I found several cans of pumpkin yesterday so am anxious to try out your recipe. My son & his wife live in Charlotte NC and we just visited them a few weeks ago. Such a beautiful state! Have a cozy fall day!

We had a very hard freeze in early October (in the teens) followed by temps in the 50’s which promptly ruined any pumpkins on the vine near us. We also lost any chance for real fall color. As Fall is my favorite season, I refer to it as the "Autumn of our discontent"! Can’t wait to try the scones. Perhaps they’ll restore my mood!

Keep these ideas & pumpkin tips coming! Very useful, thanks!! (Want to hear more about the whoopee pies…never even heard of those. Any more Pumpkin Greatest Hit recipes, anyone?)

I’ve fixed my pumpkin like Shirley does in the past. Canned is nice if you don’t have the time to do your own. Can’t wait to try the scones.

As a city/suburban girl, never on a farm, I’m surprised that all you farmgirls haven’t mentioned the most delicious part of Halloween-time pumpkins: the seeds. My mother was a terrible cook (don’t get me started on her version of Thanksgiving turkey–she cooked it in a covered roaster, which produced a pot of liquid with boiled turkey pieces settling at the bottom!),but someone, somehow had taught her that baking the pumpkin seeds produced a delicious fun-to-crack-the-shells-with-your-teeth snack. A fond memory.
True to the tradition of my Mom’s bad cooking, I also produced a pumpkin recipe disaster long ago. My husband (then, my fiance) asked if I could find him some pumpkin ice cream. I decided to make it myself. What I didn’t count on was the antiquated refrigerator at his apartment. After the mixture I prepared with canned pumpkin spent a full day in the so-called freezer compartment (remember the old-style frig with a square freezer door in the middle of the top shelf?), all I had produced was orange mush. It should still taste good, I thought. Wrong! Even a loving future husband had to admit that the grainy fast-melting glop in his bowl was inedible. As advertising warnings say, don’t try this one at home–unless you have a better recipe and good freezer.

After trying my hand at raising pumpkins and getting a small crop I wanted to learn how to make pumpkin pie from scratch (using fresh pumpkins). I found that the easiest way to cook your pumpkin with out having to do all the mashing and stuff that sounds so time consuming just use a pressure cooker. Cut your small pumpkin in half (do not use your large jack-O-Lanterns for they are stringy and watery) and take out the seeds and place on the rack inside your pressure cooker with a little water in the bottom. Cook for 8 minutes on high pressure comes out perfect every-time. All you need to make two eight inch pies is three cups of cooked pumpkin.
I use this websites pumpkin pie recipe changing it a little to suit my families taste. http://www.pickyourown.org/pumpkinpie.php
I use two teaspoons of cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon of ground nutmeg, and 1/4 teaspoon of ginger. It is so good.

Love this, so true. Plugging you in to my google reader now. Looking forward to future Grace Notes!

Paula,
I was thrilled to see that you are the Suburban Farmgirl!
I love your writing and always get great insights from your Momfidence articles.
You reassure me that common sense in parenting is not dead!
Looking forward to seeing more of you here…
Blessings,
Staci

Welcome and I look forward to reading more Grace Note!

Paula, Thank you for your writing and joining "MaryJaneFarm" roster of writers. I love Rebekah’s blog also. I am a kindred spirit and writer too. My farm girl genes come from my great grandmother who lived and loved on a farm and raised 13 children who all grew up to become doctors, pharmacists, wives, mothers, daddy’s- people all who in their own way gave back to the world. Respect, morals, and God were just as much a part of farm life as chickens, clean sheets on a clothes line, and milking cows. In my city ways I have carried on farm life. Yet, even at 54 with four wonderful grown children and one grandson of my own, I still dream of living on a farm. Yet, pies bake in my urban kitchen as I dream, and I’m hoping next month when I add a few chickens to my back yard my neighbors will be too busy in their ‘city’ ways to care!! All my country best, Cate

Welcome, I can tell already that I will enjoy reading your notes- here it is a cool rainy sort of depressing day, but for a bit I was in the sun, picking herbs and goodies from my garden or the farmers’ market, riding my "pretend" horse (purple banana seated 20" wheel bike) or hanging clothes on my mom’s clothes line, or even better taking them down and burying my nose in the sheets. Yes the rain is needed, but the memory trip brought a happy smile to my heart. Thanks

Grace notes…aptly named. I love it! This rings true in my heart. I was born and raised in suburban Michigan. My parents grew up as farmers and became factory workers to support their family, back when that was "a really good job." My Dad grew enormous gardens in our yard and in the empty lots nearby. My Mom canned everything in sight in addition to working full time and had the basement pantry of colorful filled quart jars to prove it. Looking back, I don’t know how they did it. Dad hunted and we all fished; the bounty fed us. We picked blueberries in the woods for free and shucked bushels of peas on the back porch. Technically, I have never lived in the country but I am a farm girl at heart. I put myself through college and became a nurse, moved to Texas after college, where I spent over the next twenty years in the suburbs again. I have sewn most of my children’s clothing when they were small, been a single parent, cooked and baked from scratch, crocheted, knitted, gardened and canned a little bit. I have to buy the berries or pay to pick them but I still love making jam. It feeds my soul as much as my family. We moved to Oklahoma two years ago after the children were grown and I am blessed with grace notes more and more each day. We live in a neighborhood of lots just over a half acre in a rural area. I have learned to card fiber, spin my own yarn and weave in addition to my other loves. I see red tailed hawks and deer regularly. I dance with the Okie wind while I hang laundry on the line. I have found friends with whom I share my heart as well as our interests. Grace notes are like fireflies in the summer sky. My heart is full.

Welcome! It’s nice to meet another farmgirl at heart….as my husband and I just moved to North Carolina.

Hi
I’m glad you’re here. I live in suburban South Fla. but am a country farm girl at heart. Grew up in Ohio, learned to grow veggie and flowers there. Miss Fall with every fiber of my being, as well as all the aesthetics of the North. It’s been interesting these 40 years, trying to bring what I love to an area and climate which fights me all the way. But persist I have, and been succesful, some of the time. I have a maple tree in the back which gives us a modicum of fall color in January. It even loses it’s leaves, we rake them and lie in the pile. You do what you can.
I’m looking forward to meeting you and all the other suburban farmers.
Linda

Welcome! I love when people write (or speak for that matter) from the heart. I look forward to reading your future posts!

I loved this article! I am collecting not just Bonanza DVDs, but also "Petticoat Junction", "Bewitched", "Green Acres", "Rawhide", "Beverly Hillbillies" and the other fun, active, outdoorsy TV series of the 60’s. Instead of whiney people sitting on a couch in a living room (the recent sit-coms), the older shows showed people really moving around, and getting outside! I really appreciate your comment about Grace Notes – I am drawn to older linens, and dishes, pitchers with the lovely lines and textures of another time.
M. Cook

Welcome Paula! I fell in love with "Mary Jane’s Farm" fairly recently. I was so excited to see there are others out there like me. I too have always lived in the suburbs, but have lived my life with the heart of a farm girl. Growing up my favorite shows on TV were the Wilderness Family, Little House on the Prairie, How the West was won. I learned to crochet, cook, sew, can by the time I was 10. I started quilting at age 32. I was always the youngest in the classes and other people would comment about how young I was to be quilting. I shun modern conveniences. In quilting I’m looking forward this year to entering a Grandma’s Flower Garden sewn completely by hand. I don’t machine quilt. That just rushes things too much. I don’t own a microwave (to all my daughters friends amazement). I cook only from scratch and love every minute of it. I take great pride in providing my family with healthy and nutritious foods for every meal. To this day I still dream of having my own farm. It seems to logical progression. I still can, freeze and dry most of our food for the winter. I buy all our produce at the local farmers market. Thursdays are my favorite day of the week. That’s market day. I’ve learned all the names of those I purchase from. Not something often found in the city (or suburbs because we’re too busy).

I eagerly look forward to you future post! Welcome!

Thanks so much for your thoughts – I live in town, but I wear an apron, hang my clothes out when I can, do my dishes by hand sometimes, have lots of "old stuff" around…

Thank you for sharing your love of farm living in the cit. I too live in the city and try to bring as much farm into my life as I can.Behind my garage are five beautiful chickens. Every day I look forward to letting them out of their coupe so they can tell me the morning gossip! One by one they march out and start reporting about all the happenings that took place in the dark of night. There are tales of cats walking about the coup and other animals that they can’t quite make out in the shadows of the moon.And of course there is the tattle telling of who crowded who on the roost and who decided their not going to lay for a while.Later in the day if the weather is nice or even a little cool, you can find me in my plastic lawn chair just watching the girls go about their day. I find it very peaceful to watch their dirt bath. their feathers make such a lovely noise as they splash the dry dirt up over their bodies.Grazing for bugs and tender plants is another peaceful scene.They seem to not have a care in the world as they walk along singing and looking for the next bite.All of my cares and concerns melt away too!I have other stories of hanging out laundry on the clothes line and learning to make home made soap but the chickens are what I love best. Thanks for letting me share.
Denise Kilman

I grew up in a small town in Iowa, and I could hear the screen door close, and smell the freshly dried, clean sheets as I read your ‘Grace Notes.’ The feel of clover flowers between your toes and taking a strawberry from the patch also came to mind. Thanks for that moment on this rather deary rainy day(after a week with no sun)in the
middle of a city. I keep planting anywhere I can and did harvest an alley pumpkin this year-also tomatoes, green beans, and kale along the garage. I still use wooden clothes pins, and I have my grandma’s gardening bandanna-it is salmon and olive green.

Great blog, I also live in the burbs, but my brothers farm is just a few miles away, can get a fix pretty fast when needed, better than any medicine!

Thanks alot, I can not get the Bonanze theme out of my head, speaking of grace notes. Thanks for your words of wisdom

Very nice column! I too find myself in a North Carolina subdivision at the moment, and yet surrounding by tobacco farms, soybeans, cattle and horses. It’s lovely, and it’s nice to read about someone elses similar experiences. Looking forward to the next post!

Welcome Paula!

I recognize you from Women’s Day which is one of my favorite magazines. I’ve lived in NYC my whole life, but I have many suburban family and friends, so it will be nice to read your farmgirl perspectives in your grace notes.

Howdy & Welcome!! I had the crush on "little" Joe & carried a Bonanza lunch box for three years (new one each year, different design – I ran with the My Friend Flicka, Black Beauty lunch box crowd – Bonanza fit right in!)

A farmgirl heart starts early in life!

Welcome to the farm. I grew up in Michigan and we moved around from city to country to living in the village limits but had a farm field right across the street. Playing in the corn fields, running around in them, climbing trees, and watching all the 60’s sitcoms that was in the country. Helping my Mom, Aunt and my best friend’s mom can everything under the sun. I grew up surronded by farms but didn’t live on a farm. I still live in Michigan and live in the country in 4-plex apartment! I have a very small space to grow tomatoes and green peppers. Have a freezer full of farm growing meat, not the kind that is in the grocery stores. So welcome from one Michigander to another Michigander!

Thanks Paula.
Loved the column and look forward to reading more. Didn’t know there was a name for my leanings but now I know it is a perfect description. I receive so much satisfaction by simple things like doing the laundry and hanging it out to dry, baking – my altime favourite and creating a heart home for my family. Farm life in my book has meant honest hardworking simple loveable life and people. They are real people with no hidden agenda. I love to look out at the mountains and to walk along the beach. I love the countryside but live and work in Suburbia. The outdoors or my kitchen are my absolute favourite places to be.

I was raised and lived in the city for 27 years until I met and married my husband. When we got married we bought a house in a small town and at first I wondered "What am I doing out here?" I even made him promise that when something happened to my mom and dad, we would but their house in the city and move back. In the first year, my husband had me helping with the chores on the farm he worked and I learned so much about about farm life. Within three years we had a chance to buy 5 acres and build a house. We are 10 miles from town and I’m still not far enough away fron city life. I never did buy my folks house and ‘go home again’. I guess the farm girl was there all the time and I never knew. My life on the farm has been wonderful. My husband passed a year and a half ago and I miss him dearly, and am so greatful for all I learned from him. Keep the words coming and I’ll keep reading.

Hi Paula!!! What a great website! I was raised on a farm in Kentucky, but now call Los Angeles my home. I will always be a farmgirl at heart. I can’t wait to read more!
Jennifer

Wow, thanks, everyone, for the neighborly welcome!! I love hearing everyone’s personal variations on suburban farmgirlness… and who knew there were so many Bonanza lovers left and girls who fed carrots to their bicycles?! I’m very glad to "know" you all! Paula

My sister "Rodeo Rise’" wants to know if this rings a bell with you? Sung to the tune of the Bonanza theme song "here in the West we’re livin in the best…Bonanza Hoss and Joe and Adam know every rock and pine..Repeat…..
Thought you’d like that She says it’s on the Album Lorne Greene sings
You 2 are peas in a pod
Michele