Category: Farmtastic Faves

We love farm life, and sometimes we come across extra special critters, people, products, and companies that we want to share with you. Please know, we will always be transparent if we are being sponsored or paid for content. Most of the time we are not, it’s just our way to share the joy.

Grizzly the Cat Watches Hallmark Yule Log Why We Love Hallmark
Farmtastic Faves · Lessons & Thoughts From the Farm

Why We Love Hallmark

My Farmtastic LifeLeave a comment

When I was growing up, Hallmark was the store where you bought the BEST cards, and like the old slogan said, you’d send a Hallmark card when you cared enough to send the very best.  When I would hand my mom, a woman who quite frankly prefers cards over gifts, an envelope with the tell-tale gold crown seal, she would smile and say, “Oh, it’s a Hallmark!”

Hallmark Ornament - Chocolate Moose
Chocolate Moose, a Hallmark ornament from 2007, and one of our farm faves. He gets a prime spot on the tree each year to show off his movable dangly legs.

After Cowboy and I got married, Hallmark became known in our house as the purveyor of our favorite Christmas ornaments.  He’d get the car, tractor, or airplane series, while I’d get the Winnie the Pooh or whimsical animal characters.  When our tree is covered in these memories and reminders of childhood, hobbies, and dreams, it is transformed into my absolute favorite Christmas tradition. Heck, we’ve gathered so many ornaments over the years they even have their own box for storage. (And no, that doesn’t mean we have enough. And yes, I still buy new ones every year.)

Today, Hallmark is best known for TV, Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Movies and Mysteries specifically.  While they’re most famous for turning out oodles of Christmas movies, they also make movie magic with made-for-TV series, cozy mysteries, and other seasonal flicks.  And if you’ve watched even a couple of these movies, you inevitably know how they will turn out.  Happily!  There seems to be a delightful formula to it all:

  • Woman has important city life/job aspirations/family business. Bonus points for chef, writer, professor, flower shop owner, or decorator jobs.
  • Woman’s life gets interrupted by family or job opportunity/obligations/loss. Bonus points for family inns, bakeries, and tree farms.
  • Woman travels to scenic small town/village/farm to address said challenge.  Bonus points if the woman is already there and the opportunity comes to her.
  • Woman runs into old flame/new flame, and is rarely thrilled about it at the beginning. Bonus points if woman has existing flame she must extinguish.
  • Woman finds her true meaning by following her career passion and also learns to view the guy in a new light and they live happily ever after.  Bonus points if children, dogs, or cats come with the package.

I’m sure the writers would tell you that it’s definitely more complicated than that, and I have no doubt that it is. Heaven knows, no one has been able to replicate their special magic, and criticizing someone else’s art and creation is not my jam.  But why are we so drawn in when we know how it will end?  From the opening scenes of charming downtown shops, cityscapes, and country vistas, we are hooked. We know that two hours later, crisis will be averted, hearts will be happy, and the future will be bright.

That’s the magic.  In a world that can feel crazy, sometimes our hearts just want to escape to a place where things will be okay.  We’re living in a time that can feel especially vulnerable with quarantined family and friends, stores and restaurants closed, and fear and uncertainty easy to find in large doses. Sitting down with a cozy blanket, a cup of tea, and a Hallmark movie (or 12), could be just what your heart needs.

So hats off to Hallmark this weekend for re-running some of their best-loved Christmas movies, with their We Need a Little Christmas Movie Marathon.  Christmas is known as the season of giving, so during what are unprecedented times, let’s make sure that we fill our hearts up with love over fear, check on our neighbors (virtually of course, social distancing rules apply), share what we can, and remember that this too will pass.  And most importantly, when it does may we all be better for it. (Oh, and please wash your hands!)

P.S.  If you’re like me and love a good list checking app, Hallmark has you covered. Through the Hallmark app you can  make lists of what you want to see, get reminders for airings you don’t want to miss, and keep count of how many movies you’ve watched (which trust me, can quickly become A LOT.)

P.P.S. It’s hard to find a Hallmark store these days, but if you can find one, it’s absolutely worth it and you will be delighted. You simply can’t help but smile as you roam the aisles filled with heartfelt and funny cards, colorful home accessories, and unique treasures that make the perfect gifts.

P.P.P.S. This is not an advertisement and no money, gifts, or favors were exchanged in return for this post.

The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee by Talya Tate Boerner Farmtastic Faves – The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee
Farmtastic Faves · Farmtastic Reads

Farmtastic Faves – The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee

My Farmtastic Life4 Comments

The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee – Talya Tate Boerner

Oh my stars am I ever in love with the grit, wit, and wisdom of 10-year-old Gracie Lee.  Set in the sweltering heat of an Arkansas delta summer, we are invited to come along for the ride as Gracie Lee navigates the beauty and the brutality of the hard truths that life has dealt her, and in some ways the truths and the questions that are in all of us.

Told in first person, Gracie reminds us of the bravery, curiosity, and compassion that children possess in spades, and that we often spend a lifetime trying to figure out how to recapture.  From the first moment she marches down the church aisle to ask her a pastor a question, which hilariously ends up in her accidental salvation, to her quest to find out who lives in the big house next door to the myriad of emotions she experiences as she watches the unraveling of her alcoholic father, Gracie has you cheering for her on every page.

Gracie’s family is complex – a loving but exhausted mother who wants nothing more than to be loved herself, a younger sister who requires comfort and other times a good eye roll, and a dad who is checked out emotionally but dedicated to the hard work of financially providing for his family.  The lives of this famer’s family weave and bob around each other as they live in their reality of barely hanging on to the middle class, and at times each other.  They deal with the precariousness and mystery of nature including flooding rains, crop cycles, and our human desire to harness it all.  And most of all, our desire to connect and understand.

Growing up Baptist in the south, I can whole heartedly testify (see what I did there?) that Talya has captured every nuance of the culture – both the Baptist and the southern – all rolled into one big patchwork quilt.  I was humming along as the congregation sang every endless verse of Just as I Am.  I was reminiscing at the details of unscheduled childhood summer days where bicycle exploration and ham sandwiches with mayonnaise, iceberg lettuce, and white bread were what made our world go round.  If you grew up in the south anytime between the 1950s and early 1980s, I suspect you’ll feel your senses toggle between the feeling of home and “oh my what were we thinking.”

This is my absolute favorite kind of fiction – one where the landscape is as big of a character as the people, one where you feel the sense of place as large as life.  Most importantly, while it is fiction, you know that there are thousands of Gracies in this world, and you simply want to cheer for each and every one of them.

P.S. – This farmgirl loves a good book – whether that book makes you laugh, cry, refreshes your soul, dances with your imagination, or teaches you a history lesson.  Books are just the bees knees.  Check out our Farmtastic Faves section for more of our favorites.

P.P.S. – Check out Tayla’s website for more information about her and the book.

Featured image Amazon. 

Barking to the Choir - The Power of Radical Kinship Farmtastic Faves – Barking to the Choir
Farmtastic Faves · Farmtastic Reads

Farmtastic Faves – Barking to the Choir

My Farmtastic Life1 Comment

This farmgirl loves a good book – whether that book makes you laugh, cry, refreshes your soul, dances with your imagination, or teaches you a history lesson.  Books are just the bees knees.  We’ve had our Farmtastic Faves section for a while, and we think it desperately needs a Farmtastic Reads section.  So in an effort to share one of my absolute all time favorite things – STORIES – here goes.

First up in the Farmtastic Reads category …

Barking to the Choir: The Power of Radical Kinship – Gregory Boyle

I must admit, up until about a year ago, the chances of me making it through any nonfiction book were slim to none.  For years, my reading was limited to mystery fiction, and I wasn’t really open to exploring much else.  It was my guilty pleasure. Last year, a wise soul turned me onto Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, then Love Wins by Rob Bell, and well my bookshelves – virtual and real – are so much broader, deeper, and richer for it.

With my reading horizons expanded, I’ve found that I am usually reading a book or five (thank you Kindle), and in that mix is always something that speaks to the broader sense of humanity, spirituality, and the divine.  On the recommendation of a friend on Instagram, I added Barking to the Choir: The Power of Radical Kinship to my list.

Filled with engaging, uplifting, and at times gut wrenching stories of men and women coming out of gang life and into the fullness of seeing their own value and divinity, Gregory Boyle, a Jesuit Priest affectionately known as Father G, reaches straight into the heart of our shared humanity.  He deftly weaves his personal observations and experiences with lessons that we can all take to heart.

You know it’s a good book when you and your highlighter become besties as you try to soak up every last nugget of truth, hoping that just a tiny bit of the goodness you are experiencing will stick to your core.

Father G doesn’t mince words.  He sheds the formality and the perfection facade common in many religious circles and writings, not afraid of using strong language and slang to make his point, and to simply remind us all of the realness and the emotion of life.  Father G strips away the sterileness that modern Christianity can often be wrapped in, and shares the gritty truth about trauma, loss, and hope.  In short, he takes us back to the original story of Jesus – connectedness and kindness, compassion and love.

My emotions ran the gamut while reading this book. At one point, so moved by a former gang member’s story of loss and redemption that I found myself crying. At other times laughing out loud at the sheer smart and witty dialogue of these former gang members who were coming to see the beauty of their true selves, often for the first time.

You’ll also get a feel (or more accurately all the feels) for Homeboy Industries, started by Father G in 1988 as an answer to the question, ““Can we improve the health and safety of our community through jobs and education rather than through suppression and incarceration?”1

Barking to the Choir is a neon reminder that we  make it far too easy to write off the other in our world – the gang member, the mentally ill, the poor.  We’ve come to believe everything is a simple choice, while forgetting the impact of heartbreak, trauma, and fear on the human spirt .  That we are all fragile, and strength comes in our kinship, in our ability to see and be seen for who we really are. Father G puts these truths front and center and reminds us all that we are the choir.

This is Father G’s second book, and believe you me within an hour of finishing this one, I  ordered his first one, Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion.  Come on Amazon Prime speedy delivery, this farmgirl has some soulful reading to do!

1 – History of Homeboy Industries

Featured image Amazon.