So it’s apparently been about two years since I’ve written a blog! How crazy is that? The very thing that got me thinking about a YouTube channel, writing, has somehow taken a backseat to my job!

I popped on here the other day and pawed through a few old posts, had a few giggles and realized how much I miss writing. I really shouldn’t be on here right now- I’ve got a hundred things to get done in the next hour. There’s a rainstorm suppossed to hit and last the next 3 days off and on, and the stuff I need to do requires FULL dryness. My daughter has a dentist appointment late this morning, and I’ll be gone at least 2 hours. The sun is shining, and the breezing picking up over the fields carries the delicious aroma of springtime.

I need to get outside and work.

But just like I need to touch base with my inner nature lover once in a while, I also need to do the same with my inner writer. Farm Wife Meredith is a writer. She writes blogs and articles for agricultural magazines. But for me, writing blogs is only putting a band-aid on the real issue. I thrive on writing stories. On exploring the enigmas of the human brain, people relating to each other, working out solutions to their issues or struggling through them blindly.

Many people are born and enter life as adults not knowing what they were born to do. I always knew I was born to write. Specifically, fiction.

You might think writing a story and telling a tale is simple. Easier than say, writing a blog from your heart.

You would be correct.

However, those rare, enticing morsels of fiction, the ones that grab and hold even the strictest non-reader, those are the ones that dive deep into the psyche of what it means to be human. To really break-open the sub-conscience of how the mind works. The type of story your heart begs you to put down and bury forever, but your brain marches forward, determined to find resolution in the story as it correlates so closely to one in your own life.

It’s not a story. It’s virtual reality in word form, and you are right there in the middle of it, experiencing and responding just as the characters in the book do.

Unfortunately there is one key ingredient writing like that requires and I DON’T have: time.

I don’t have time. I barely have time to get my memoir completed and shipped out. However, I understand that God has a time and place for everything, and everything in my life has only increased my awareness of the human heart, how the mind works, and the tragedy they can bring.

Life is but a beautiful tragedy. Full of failed goals, missed opportunities, death, and lost love. But despite this, the beauty of it all remains: failed goals lead to greater determination, missed opportunities lead to better ones and love that seemed lost is suddenly found.

Life is, only what you see it to be in each day, in each moment.

At this moment I better get my butt back to work!

One of my favorite farm activities to do, is collect free food — aka, forage.

Sure you’ve got your typical wild raspberries, blackberries and black raspberries, along with the wild apple trees. But this year, I discovered something new: ground cherries!

Curiously enough, I had bought a packet of ground cherry seeds along with all my veggie seeds this year. They sounded like a great way to get berries NOW in your garden and not have to wait a few years.

However, after doing some research on them, I discovered that I had them growing wild on the property. So this year, I set out to find the wild ones and try them out!

I’d like to point out now, that ground cherries are a very persistent weed, and grow ANYWHERE, but especially sandy soil. Since they use an underground running root system, they can pop-up anywhere you DON’T want them! After a bit of exploring, I found several dozen plants growing in my sand pit.

Now ground cherries grow their “cherry” in a papery husk (like a tomatillo), which makes them a cinch to identify (along with their hailing yellow flower with purple center). When I found these plants, I excitedly dug a few up to plant in my garden, then went back a week later to check for fruit.

I didn’t know much about them, so when I found several husks dangling from under their leaves, I excitedly plucked one and pulled off the paper.

The “cherry” was green. From what I’d remembered reading, some species have yellow fruits, some green, and some orange.

I split the small cherry in half. The insides were filled with tiny seeds and lots of dry pulp. It didn’t look very tasty, but I figured I’d give it a go. So I took a nibble off one side . . .

And promptly spit it out!

It tasted like . . . . a weed!

Bleh, that was NOT what I was expecting! This wasn’t right.

Wait . . . I suddenly remembered somethign ELSE I’d read about the plant . . . it was a relative of the deadly Nightshade Plant!

Oh man, maybe I’d eaten Nightshade instead!

I quickly looked the plant up online. Nope, not the same plant.

But . . . it WAS still poisonous!

Apparently the fruit was not “ripe” yet, the green fruit always turns yellowish when ripe, and ONLY ripens on the plant. And . . . the green ones ARE POISONOUS!

I’m not sure how bad, but I’m glad I spit it out.

The whole way home I was convinced my throat was closing-over though!

I have yet to taste these supposedly amazing treats, but I’m hoping they are everything people claim!

Yes.

While many things no doubt run through your head about what WTF means, and it does mean all of those things, the real name is “What The Farm Girl”. Or, better transitioned to “WTFarm Girl”.

Simply put, because the name “Farm Girl” was already taken by ex-playboy model “Banshee Moon”. While not really a “farm girl”, she does live on a farm, and at the age of 50 looks damn good (don’t most Playboy Models?).

“WTFarm Girl” is my new video blog YouTube channel, or rather, “vlog” as they are called. And, unlike Banshee Moon, I actually do work! Everything, as you already know.

Based on comments and stalkers on Facebook, I realized a lot of people (especially other women) really admire what I do and look forward to hearing about my many adventures (and super fails).

90% of everything I do out here is a learned trait that I had to acquire “on the spot”. I see many women moaning about not having someone to “help” them with something, instead of trying to do it themself, and it got me thinking that they just need some inspiration.

Hence the channel.

To inspire other women/people to “try something new”, to get dirty, and to learn something. Oh, and lets not forget the entertainment factor!

So far I’ve only got 2 videos up. On average it takes me about a week to complete a video. Many, many hours with plenty of interruptions!

So, spread the word, subscribe to my channel and lets get this thing rocking!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQuEO01jp9V9fqIRHilwc9A

With all of the work to be done around here, and way too much serious business to attend to, I’ve found one of the best stress relievers is scaring people.

I don’t know, there’s something calming about hiding silently in a dark closet, breathing slowly, waiting, listening, picking the right tactic and making a slight rustling sound. Then another. Then a bit louder as you peek through the crack of the door and watch them cautiously glance over at the closet, that look of trepidation on their face hoping the sound goes away so they don’t have to check it out. You wait a few more minutes, then rustle again, quieter. Their head shoots rights up out of their phone, eyes wide, and they slowly crawl across the floor as you poise yourself for your next move.

The closet door s flung open, and you manage to fall out on top of them, uttering the most horrific of sounds. They release a flood of sounds just as horrible, and then screams of anger when they finally come to their senses and realize the trick you had played.

It just gets the endorphins going!

And so, I’ve been banned from hiding and scaring people.

My argument is that it’s educational. You don’t want someone worse sneaking-up and grabbing you, or beating you over the head. You need to constantly be aware of your surroundings and plan accordingly.

When we first moved onto the property, there was a lot of discussion about bears, and wolves, and coyotes and cougars. And Big Foot.

One day I had a thought. We had game cams all over the property and the kids always get excited to see what’s on them. Why not dress up in a Big Foot costume, and slowly creep across the camera area? Maybe dragging a deer carcass or some other unfortunate object.

As the kids watch the video, and get freaked out, you then place “Big Foot tracks” all around the house the next day. . .

Another idea was the garden patrol creature. This nifty invention is a motion-activated fan-dancer waving guy. Used in gardens to scare away animals, it inflates instantly when the laser line of sight is crossed. We had thought about putting it out by the bus stop in the early morning hours. As soon as the kids hit the line of sight and go running to get on the bus, the waving guy inflates instantly to tower 20 feet above them.

More realistically, I’ll probably just settle for the coyote call. I got a pretty nifty remote controlled coyote call for Christmas and the sounds are amazing. I could easily set it up by the road, place a few questionable foot prints around there, and sit behind a tree and control the sounds. Single coyote nearby? Check. Sounds of animal being tortured? check! Sounds of unknown origin? You bet!

The only reason I haven’t is I want to video it. It will be worth the wait.

Nothing fails to infuriate me more than people who assume I do nothing all day. Now this might stand to reason considering my house is trashed and much of the time so is my yard. However, 9 times out of 10 I am covered in either poop, dirt, grease, maple syrup (that was a few days ago), water or diesel fuel.

I am doing SOMETHING 18 hours of the day. The remaining 6 I am sleeping.

There is no “end of the workday”, there are no weekends. Heck, I don’t even get Mother’s Day, Christmas OR my birthday off!

So when my daughter made a snarky comment about how I don’t do anything all day, I lit it up.

No, I didn’t yell. I simply explained that there are so many chores to get done that it would take 3 or 4 people to keep up on all them, so pretty much nothing is ever fully done (except for cleaning the animals out).

As the conversation progressed, it became quite clear to me that my child had fallen into the tight grip of social media and TV and lost track of reality. Being a city-kid and all, life on the farm has been a bit hard for her to enjoy.

Now, you may be wondering why on earth we’d have so many kids, and NONE of them with any chores?

Well, the answer to that one is long and arduous so I’ll save that for another time.

But I’d had enough, and if my own child is questioning WHY one thing or another that “should be so simple” isn’t done, then guess what? She just earned herself an apprenticeship!

As parents it’s our job to raise our kids the best we can, and I’ve certainly been guilty of being so overly busy with “work” that I haven’t paused to ensure my own child understands the importance of work.

I fully expect her to hate me by the first week of summer vacation, and probably not speak to me the remainder of it. But if she can at least grasp a small amount of what it takes to keep things running around here, well, then it just might be worth it.

It’s spring in Michigan, and like many people we have been out looking for spring mushrooms. Most notably, the morel.

We have NEVER found a morel on our property.

Oh sure, we’ve spent hours upon hours searching. But wouldn’t you know, every time I’m certain I’m going to find one, I find something else instead . . . fresh deer poop and deer footprints.

For two years now, the areas that SHOULD be holding morels, have come up empty, except for the deer signs. I read online about how people will swear up and down that deer won’t eat morels. I guess our deer didn’t get the memo.

Two years ago, we heard from word of mouth that our neighbor had collected piles of them from her tree area.

Unless she’s making up stories, we should have some as well.

Spring is not a total bust here though, there are other edibles popping up for dinner!

RAMPS

A relative of garlic, ramps (seen far left) are ONLY found in spring. Once the weather warms, the leaves shrivel and die, hiding the tasty bulbs until next year.

Ramps are easy to find. They have twin leaves that come together at a short, pinkish stalk. They look NEARLY IDENTICAL to Lily of the Valley, except for the reddish stem. If you pluck them, they will smell like onions or fresh garlic. If you dig down a few inches, you’ll find an oblong bulb. Pull-up the entire plant to harvest, or just pluck the leaves.

RAMPS CAN BE TRANSPLANTED. If you’re out hiking, you can dig them up and re-plant at home.

Ramps like wet soil. Any area next to water makes them happy. Pretty much any area skunk cabbage will grow.

RAMPS ARE UNCOMMON.

If you find a large area of them, be very excited. They are fairly rare. We have NO NATVE RAMPS anywhere on our swampy property. I DID however, transplant our bunch from our previous house, which were transplanted from my Dad’s house.

RAMPS GROW SLOWLY!

Don’t pick them all! Only pick 1/3 of them or less. They multiply VERY slowly. I planted maybe 10 plants 4 years ago. I have maybe 15 this year. It’s the same at my Dad’s house. They just don’t multiply very fast unless you have lots!

HOW TO EAT:

Slice thinly, and saute in butter over medium heat with meats, veggies or mushrooms. Goes great with venison!

PHEASANT BACK MUSHROOMS

No luck with morels? Try pheasant backs! (Seen middle of photo) These tasty treats grow off the side of dead or dying Elm trees. Wait, what? Yes, you often find them in morel areas. They LOVE wet swamps, and truthfully ALL our pheasant backs have been found in swampy areas.

Easily identified by their pattern of “feathers” on their tops, they are the only mushroom growing on the side of a tree in springtime (unless you get some early/late oysters).

Pheasant backs come in all sizes.

I’ve seen pheasant backs grow to 2 feet wide . . . in the middle of winter!

Size does NOT equal tastiness. It’s actually nighttime temps that SEEM to determine texture on these mushrooms. I’ve had tough small ones, and tender large ones, and vice versa.

THIS IS ONE OF THE TRICKIEST MUSHROOMS TO HARVEST.

No lie. My Aunt has harvested and eaten MANY types of mushrooms, but never had luck with Pheasant Backs. I’ve cooked several tasty ones.

They smell/taste lightly of lemon and cucumber. A light, refreshing taste in stark contrast to many other mushroom varieties.

RULE OF THUMB

If you can easily snap-off an edge of the mushroom with your fingers, it’s good for eating. If you have to twist/tear an edge off, it’s too tough to bother with.

**I’m not sure if a mushroom that’s tough one day will be soft on another day, but they do seem to keep growing if you let them stay on the tree.

DANDALION GREENS

Considered a weed by most, dandelions are actually extremely healthy for you, and help cleanse your liver and kidneys. Make sure any leaves you harvest have not been sprayed with weed killer.

Leaves can be eaten raw as a garnish or in a salad, or sauteed with other spring treats. They have a lightly bitter flavor to them.

BOTTOM LINE:

While morels might be choice, other spring treats are waiting to be found as well!