Sunday, March 8, was International Women’s Day, helping to kick off Women’s History Month in March. Women’s Day has been celebrated in America since 1909 and in Austria, Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland since 1911. In 1975, the United Nations finally declared it an international holiday.
Companies and organizations around the world and the web are celebrating women, and here are a few of the sites I thought you’d enjoy.
Biographile, Random House’s nod to literary biographies, celebrates with “quotes from 9 literary ladies.”
Maya Angelou, Charlotte Bronte, Virginia Woolf, Toni Morrison, and Margaret Atwood, Biographile.com
Microsoft reminds us that girls like science, too, with their latest commercial:
The initiative, a collaboration between the Clinton Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, posted this celebrity-, fun- (and fact-) filled video:
And the winner of the One World Family Calendar giveaway is:
Lisa VonSaunder, who said:
“These herder woman look like Masai tribeswomen. I support small business people in emerging nations by donating small amounts to Kiva.com. which is a micro lending organization. They loan like $100 or so to small businesses usually run by women, and then that allows them to make huge changes in their lives. They have a 95% repayment log. I urge you to go the site and look at the people you can help make a living directly. I chose my latest person, a cobbler in Burkina Faso, the poorest nation in the world, and he paid back my loan in less than a year. That is equivalent to double his yearly salary! This is the way I think and help globally.”
And the original post for the GIVEAWAY was (thank you to all who participated):
I recently picked up two of these handy “family calendars” with the intent of gifting one. Plus, I wanted to support the organization behind it. The One World Family Calendar features beautiful photography of people from around the world, along with space for daily schedules for up to five people. It’s a beautiful calendar that will help you plan the rest of your family’s year.
This calendar comes from the New Internationalist: People, Ideas, and Action for Global Justice.
With new technologies, the whole wide world is at our fingertips, and we can help those in other countries as well as our own by shopping with a global responsibility in mind. And if you don’t think you support buying things from overseas, take a closer look around … that melon purchased in December probably came from South America, and that cell phone positively came from the other side of the globe. And wait … before venting about buying American-made, please realize that it’s an opinion typed on a computer that was most certainly made in China, Japan, or Taiwan. Sorry, Dorothy, but we’re not in Kansas anymore. We’re all part of a bigger picture, and that picture involves supporting workers around the world—not governments, but workers, people like you and me. So my stand is, I support workers, wherever they happen to live. Made in the USA, awesome. Project F.A.R.M. (First-class American Rural Made), love it. And yes, Made in the World. For me, they’re no longer mutually exclusive.
To win this beautiful calendar, tell me why you’ve decided to embrace the whole wide world and ALL the working people in it. We’ll put your name in a hat and pull out one lucky winner sometime in the next week or so. Stay tuned!
In keeping with the proverbial madness of the March hare (which, by the way, refers to the phenomenon of bunnies acting bonkers during their spring breeding season) …
Photo by Hardyplants via Wikimedia Commons
I thought it would be fun to quiz you on a few obscure names for animal babes. Take a gander at the list of names, below:
1. Eyas
2. Shoat
3. Leveret
4. Cygnet
5. Sac Fry
6. Yowie
Now, try to match each name to the young animal it refers to:
A. Pig
B. Hawk
C. Swan
D. Salmon
E. Rabbit
F. Sheep
You’ll find answers beneath each photo that follows, so don’t peek till you’ve made your matches.
Photo by Dominicus Johannes Bergsma via Wikimedia Commons
Eyas [ahy-uhs] is a nestling hawk or falcon (eyas is a variant of the Middle French niais, meaning “nestling”).
Photo by a United States Department of Agriculture employee via Wikimedia Commons
Shoat [shoht] is a young pig that has recently been weaned from its mother’s milk.
Photo by JJ Harrison via Wikimedia Commons
Leveret [lev-er-it] is a young rabbit or hare, specifically one that is less than a year old.
Photo by Uwe Kils via Wikimedia Commons
Cygnet [sig-nit] is a young swan.
Photo by Fernando de Sousa via Wikimedia Commons
Sac fry [sack fry] is a newly hatched salmon that remains safely hidden in the gravel habitat of its streambed nest until its yolk sac (or “lunch box,” as scientists commonly call it) is depleted.
Photo by Keven Law via Wikimedia Commons
Yowie [yow-ee] is the diminutive version of the old Scottish term yowe, which means ewe. So, “yowie” describes a little ewe.
As a side note, you might be interested to know that “yowie” also refers to a mythical hominid reputed to live in the Australian wilderness—you know, like our Mr. Bigfoot, only he appears to have less hair …
Photo by Somersetpedia.paul via Wikimedia Commons
One last word to the wise: if you holler “yowie!” to summon a lamb, someone may rush to your aid, thinking you’ve dropped a hammer on your toe.
Just sayin’.
The Internet is certainly an interconnected web of wonders. Have you ever sat down at your computer to do a quick search for something, then hours later, you emerge from the fog of wandering through an endless trail of treats you didn’t even know you were seeking? If you have the patience, the rewards can be, well, rewarding.
That happened to me recently, while working on an article for the next issue of our magazine. We mentioned a local art venue, Artisans at the Dahmen Barn, in Uniontown, Washington. The Dahmen barn is a beautiful old barn in a tiny farming town about 15 miles outside Moscow, Idaho, that’s been known for decades for its whimsical wagon-wheel fence, assembled by owner and artist Steve Dahmen over a 30-year period. Today, the fence exhibits over 1,000 wheels.
In 2004, the barn was falling into disrepair, so Steve and his wife Junette, also an artist, donated the barn to their community to be made into an art center, providing studio space for artists to work in and sell their creations, a place for local artists and fine craftspeople to sell their work on consignment, a venue for local performing and exhibiting artists, and creative experiences for children and adults through classes and workshops. Read about the transformation of the barn here.
When working on the article, I poked around their website to do a little research, and saw they are planning an Annual Art Demonstration Day on Saturday, April 11. This year’s theme is books—books of all types, things made from books, or information about books. And that led to an amazing video from bookmaker Randi Parkhurst. I don’t see that Randi is slated to appear at the event, but someone else’s rabbit trail must have led to her video to provide inspiration for those interested in books, or art, or lessons in patience … you see how the tangled web is woven. Anyway, watch this lovely video to the end, and your patience will be rewarded, I promise!
Buy props used in MaryJane’s books and magazine!
5% of profits will benefit www.firstbook.org, a non-profit that provides new books to children from low-income families throughout the U.S. and Canada.
Here’s how:
MaryJane will post a photo and a description of a prop and its cost along with a few details as to its condition here: https://shop.maryjanesfarm.org/MaryJanesCurations. It’s a playful way to be the new owner of a little bit of farm herstory.
