Rainbows & rainstorms, heat & humidity, flowers and fruit…welcome July! So far summer has brought us abundant rain, incredible heat, and formidable wind gusts. We tied down everything that might blow away, slipped on raincoats and boots to unclog gutters before dawn, and tried to beat the heat with homemade ice cream and root beer floats.
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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.’”
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.
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 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.
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.”
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!
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”.
Growing up in the northeast, “knee high by the 4th of July was an important saying for our corn crops. With a shorter growing season we had to get it planted as soon as was safe to be able get the corn to that growth on time. Hoping the weather cooperated.
I too have collected many aprons over the years. It seems as though I always wear the same select few. I like the idea of turning the towels into aprons. I wear mine full so would probably change the idea up a little to make it that way. So many possibilities. Thanks for the inspiration!
I have grandma’s recipes and my mom’s. I have used them to make all sorts of pickled items including bread and butters. Love them. It’s such a blessing to carry on the traditions!
I agree with you as I wear a full apron daily too. I love the above ideas but think it wouldn’t be too difficult to add a second towel for the top and two ribbons to tie behind the neck. Now I just need to find some towels! I may check out some antique shops to look for some cute vintage patterned ones. Cooking, cleaning, gardening… I wear my aprons for it all and would feel bare without one!
Me too, Nicole…inside, outside, holidays – a must-wear! Let me know if you find some towels and make one…would love to hear!
Oh what a terrific idea, another tea towel at the top or two stitched together to give it a little more fullness…let me know if you whip up your own version! Aren’t those old recipes treasures? I agree…carrying on the old traditions keeps all those sweet memories for the next generation.
I usually make zucchini relish I just opened my last jar just in time for the new batch to be made.
My gardens are happy and healthy and for a minute weed free.
I have different aprons for different times. One for one rug hooking one for cooking one for gardening.
Great post! and boy you will have corn early.
Oh Cathy, weed-free is a dream here! It’s been nearly impossible to keep up with them. Zucchini relish is so good…like you, I just opened the last jar of hot-pepper jam. Soon it’ll be time to make more! And you’re right…this morning I could smell the sweetness of the corn in the air as it’s all just begun to tassel. Time flies!
Ahhh…Pickling!! It is a memory permanently etched in my head. My family loved pickles…of any kind (but mostly the dill sliced or whole variety). I did NOT like pickling season as my job was to help pick the cucumbers and then clean the the cucumbers. I would sit on the step of an old cement foundation that held the topper to my father’s old pick-up truck (which he didn’t use in the summer because he needed it to haul things (i.e., hay, etc.) with a bucket of water, a bucket of cucumbers, and scrub all the “nubbies” off. I think maybe that is why I decided I didn’t like pickles LOL. Everyone in my family LOVED pickles…and it is a trait that must be embedded in the family’s genetic code somewhere as my son would prefer them to candy any day growing up…and my grand is the same way. And while my mother wasn’t a big apron-wearer (she was a full-fledged partner in the farm duties), she certainly had 1001 “old sayings.” I could write not just a novel, but a series of novels. 😉
Robin, what absolutely wonderful memories…jot them all in a memory book to pass down! Oh those nubbies…that makes me laugh, I understand completely. Yes, please…write those novels! Your sweet farm memories are too precious not to be put to paper. I’ll need an autographed copy, please!
What wonderful memories. I bet they just fill you up! Your apron is darling. I love how you repurposed a simple tea towel into something even more functional. Enjoy the rain. Here in the Piedmont of NC, we are as dry as a bone. Continued blessings…
Hi Daisy, thanks…those early days had an impact on me, I feel like I’m following in my grandmother’s footsteps. Hope you’ve had some rain by now…would love to send you some, we’re about to float away! (And don’t get me started on the humidity that rain brings!)