You might be asking yourself, what IS a ‘farmgirl’, exactly?
I asked myself the same question when Miss V. started talking about it on Plurk. (And subsequently began the Plurkette Hencricle, which I’m proudly a member of!)
Well, taken straight from the farmgirl’s mouth:
A farmgirl believes in the strong arms of friendship, community and the just plain fun of being together. A farmgirl takes joy in the quiet satisfaction of making things with her own hands. She exudes kindness, grace, humility, gentleness, patience and generosity, and loves the simple pleasures in life. A farmgirl is loyal and caring, especially when it comes to her family, friends and community. She gives generously of her time and talents. Farmgirls love to get together to share their ideas. She can be with or without fields and stock. Farmgirl is a condition of the heart.
This struck a chord with me.
I can’t say that I’m a true “farmgirl” in the sense that I was not raised on a farm. My mother lived part of her life on a farm, and I loved to hear her stories about it when I was younger (actually, I still do), and I’ve always dreamed of living on a farm someday myself. It’s still my dream to buy an old farmhouse and have a “hobby farm”. But that’s in the future…
Though I wasn’t raised on a farm, I was raised in a family that did lots things that we always termed “old fashioned”. It was always kind of a joke among the women in my family, that we were a few generations behind the rest of the world — but I never thought it was a bad thing. Together with all our female family and friends, we bake, canned fruits and vegetables, made jellies, planted gardens, sewed, quilted, crocheted, and knit.
Like most teenagers and twenty-somethings, I lost interest in these activities for quite a few years. But now, at the age of 26, I find myself drawn back to it. I’ve taken up knitting avidly. I sew. I cook and bake. I want to go back and have my mother teach me to do canning and things that I helped with as a child, but never really learned to do myself.
I suppose it’s because now my husband and I are planning our own family and I realize just how much all these things meant to me, and how they were so important in shaping the person I’ve become. I want that same experience for my children: the simple life, far from the “rat race”, where a person can appreciate the pleasures of all things handmade and home-grown and hopefully live a life of peace, love, happiness, and health.
