Canadian artist Sarah Hatton collects dead bees.
“Why on earth would she do that?” you ask.
Like many an artist, she is out to make a point, and it’s a significant one.
Arranging dead bees into elaborate mandalas on fields of white,
Hatton is making a stark visual statement about the connection between declining bee populations and the use of pesticides.
“The link between neonicotinoid pesticides and the worldwide decline of bee populations is a crisis that cannot be ignored,” Hatton explains on her website. “I have arranged thousands of dead honeybees in mathematical patterns symbolically linked to monoculture crops, such as the Fibonacci spiral found in the seed head of the sunflower. The viewer experiences the vertigo of this lifeless swarm, a dizzying optical illusion that echoes the bees’ loss of ability to navigate due to the toxins locked within the very source of their sustenance.”
Powerful stuff.
A picture, after all, speaks a thousand words.
Here’s another quick and easy soup leading up to the big day. Potatoes! Nothing says comfort like potatoes.
Sauté 1 diced onion in 4 T butter. Add ¼ cup flour, 1 t dry mustard, and ½ t cayenne; stir for 3 minutes. Add 4 cups chicken broth, 1½ cups diced carrots, and 1½ cups diced potatoes; bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Add 2 cups half-and-half and 3 cups grated cheddar cheese; cook for 5 minutes. Add salt to taste. Serves 6.
How about you? Do you have simple soups in mind prior to the big day? I do.
Wrap 3 beets individually in foil and roast for 1 hour at 400°F. Let cool, then slip off outer skins and dice. Sauté 1 diced onion and 2 cloves minced garlic in 2 T olive oil. Add 8 cups vegetable stock, 2 cups shredded cabbage, 1 cup shredded carrots, and the beets; bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Add 2 T red-wine vinegar, 1 t sugar, 1 T lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste. Serves 8.
Weren’t we surprised. On September 1, I brought home Sweetheart, a gorgeous Jersey queen from Kansas. She traveled here with her fellow, a bull named Samson, that I had also purchased. Their previous owner had only recently allowed them to be together. Fine with me.
During the month of October, I left them together, hoping for a pregnancy. After 30 days, on Oct. 1, I did a blood draw. Yup, she’d gotten pregnant, with Samson … or so I thought. Turns out, she was already pregnant when she arrived. Very pregnant. According to my calculations, she’d be having her first baby the end of May. However, on Tuesday, Charlie, pictured here, was born. Who was the lucky guy that beat Samson to the …
Sully. A guy named Sully. Oh well.
Welcome Charlie!!!! (Properly Charles.) Just poor timing, with winter already here and temperatures hovering around 15 F the first night you were born. Just glad we found you in time to get you inside.
Mother and son doing well. Just unexpected.
Welcome New Sisters! (click for current roster)
Merit Badge Awardees (click for latest awards)
My featured Merit Badge Awardee of the Week is … Megan McIntyre!!!
Megan McIntyre (#5220) has received a certificate of achievement in Each Other for earning a Beginner, Intermediate & Expert Level Blogging Merit Badge! Great job on knocking out all three levels, Megan!
Beginner Level
-Read Blogging for Bliss: Crafting Your Own Online Journal: A Guide for Crafters, Artists & Creatives of all Kinds by Tara Frey – Check!
-Choose your topic. Pick something you are passionate about. Check! Ramblings and Creations: coop to craft. hive to home.
Intermediate Level
-Start your blog. Find a blogging host that works for you, or host your own. Started Sunday September 9, 2012.
-Pick out a name, and publish your first post. Odds & Hens (after an exhaustive week of word play), next blog idea “Ravenous Me”…
-Don’t forget to add your blog to MaryJanesFarm’s GirlGab.com. Done!
Expert Level
-Learn how to add pictures and customize your blog. Complete nearly every post! My most recent customization is the Book Review Library
-Publish at least 10 posts along with photos. Now up to more than 170 posts and several photo galleries
-Network! Create a blogging circle by visiting other blogs, writing comments, and leaving your blog’s address so they can visit you, also. Remember, building a blog and finding readers takes time. Be patient and have fun. Started, but will never complete! I also attended a local blogger’s summer camp so I didn’t get so lost in the virtual nature of blogging.
I have loved the experience of blogging. Learning about myself, being a better person, tapping into my skills and entertaining people. I plan to keep on blogging and gaining followers and traffic. Where this will take me? Nobody knows, but if this became a bigger part of my life than it already is, that is ok with me! I keep reading articles about SEO and other blog management topics. Have employed some of them and seen results. My first guest blog opportunity is coming up in the next several months.”
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.
