Monthly Archives: June 2013

Hear Ye!

Posted on June 21, 2013 by maryjane

Welcome New Sisters! (click for current roster)

Merit Badge Awardees (click for latest awards)

My featured Merit Badge Awardee of the Week is … Sarah Hall!

Sarah Hall (mrssarahhall, #5223) has received a certificate of achievement in Garden Gate for earning a Beginner Level Birds Merit Badge!

“I spent a day researching birds native to my area and selected several I would like to see. I made a wish list that I hope I can attach here with photos of the birds I would like to see and some of the information I learned about them through my research.

I really enjoyed learning about the birds. I didn’t realize that a lot of birds look different while they are mating. I particularly enjoyed reading about the sage grouse mating rituals, called strutting. I bet this is where the term “Strutting one’s stuff” came from! Owls are my favorite animal and it was challenging for me to not make an entire wish list of owls, of course I had to include one!” Wishlist_Page_11

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she’s home bound

Posted on June 20, 2013 by maryjane

headed for one last stop and long-lasting Sweet Dreams

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no more city street lights

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fresh air! … green acres is the place for me

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she’ll be coming ’round the corner when she comes

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photo-of-the-day

Posted on June 19, 2013 by maryjane

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Farm Talk

Posted on June 19, 2013 by maryjane

Cultivating your inner farmgirl?

Photo by Jacob Fowzer via Wikimedia Commons

Have a little fun with your friends and neighbors by throwing out a few old-fashioned farm phrases in casual—or, better yet, formal—conversation.

After all, if you’re going to walk the walk, you might as well talk the talk, right?

I guarantee that you’ll get a giggle from the puzzled expressions you receive in return.

Here are a few dandies to dabble with:

Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.
It’s gonna be a toad strangler (translation: a big rainstorm is coming).
Every path has a few puddles.
Trouble with a milk cow is she won’t stay milked.
Fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight, and bull-strong.
If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.
Don’t kick a fresh cow chip on a hot day.
Always drink upstream from the herd.
It don’t take a genius to spot a goat in a flock of sheep.
It’s hotter than a hen on a hot rock.
The second mouse gets the cheese.

And, by all means, don’t skinny dip with snapping turtles!

While you’re on a roll, you can beef up your down-on-the-farm vocabulary with this glossary of farming terms.

movin’ on up in the world

Posted on June 19, 2013 by maryjane

As promised, here’s Lucille, our tractor, in action.

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photo-of-the-day

Posted on June 18, 2013 by maryjane

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Sweet Dreams, Little Store!

Posted on June 18, 2013 by maryjane

My Sweet Dreams store on Jackson Street in my hometown of Moscow, Idaho, needed to move to make room for a parking lot. I kid you not. We owned the building but leased the land, and when our landlord passed away, the new owner wouldn’t budge in his decision to clear the entire block. But remember my post about doubling the size of my Coeur d’Alene store recently and the huge parking lot outside our door that’s being converted to a park? Win some, lose some. All the work we’d put into the grounds weren’t lost entirely. Every single bush, tree, bulb, and plant was lovingly dug up and replanted somewhere else. Our landscaping endeavors had won awards! Sigh.

And do you remember the colors from my Winnie the Pooh poster? Well, guess what? I had painted my little store the exact same colors. After trying to sell the building (backyard mother-in-law quarters anyone?), we decided to move it to the farm to occupy the spot where my Winnie the Pooh tree stood … without bees. A new kind of swarm was about to happen.

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We readied a spot by cutting down our one tree and then pulling out a thicket of small plum trees with the tractor. We brought in truckloads of gravel and poured a concrete pad.

Here’s my SIL, Lucas, knee deep in the muck of it.

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As each tree we pulled out with the tractor was then pulled down the road to our debris pile, my little farm was bathed in a dust storm.

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Walker had a free pass to lounge the day away.

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photo-of-the-day

Posted on June 17, 2013 by maryjane

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Honey Bee Tree

Posted on June 17, 2013 by maryjane

Remember my post on Saturday about hubby driving Lucille, our tractor, to town? I was elusive then and will be again today. Do stay tuned though. I’ll pull it all together in the end. But first, take note of the colors in this sign. I put this sign up a few years ago when my bees swarmed and took up residence in an ancient, almost rotten apple tree near where we park our cars at the farm. Okay, I thought. I won’t be able to harvest their honey, but a beehive in an apple tree sounds so right somehow.

But sadly, bears can’t read and a bear (or another critter with claws) did, in fact, raid and destroy most of the combs. The bees disappeared and never returned.

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