Author Archives: Virtual Farmgirl

As expected, the eggs I spent the most time carefully wrapping in nylon ended up with the best plant silhouettes. I’d expected that the dye bathes weren’t strong enough, but I never expected the beets bath to be so weak. But, alas, no pink or even pinkish eggs emerged from the brilliant pink bath. Nope.Continue reading “Silhouette Egg Dying: Mixed Results”

So yeah. This natural, silhouette egg-dying project is just as tedious as it sounds. Rest assured I won’t be trying this again until the kids are old enough to lend more of a helping hand or I’m with my sisters or another group of adults and we can do this together, preferably with drinks involved.Continue reading “Silhouette Egg Dying, With Natural Dyes – Part II”

What is it about Garfield that is so timeless? Last night I turned the house upside down looking for one of the iFarmer’s old Garfield books because our 7-year-old son has suddenly developed an interest in the lazy, mischievous cat. And today, Future Farmboy, like his father before him, tried his hand at a sketch.Continue reading “Next Generation Garfield Fan”

I took it as some sort of sign that two people, from completely unrelated parts of my life, sent me information about naturally dying Easter eggs. The photos from the blog posts I’ve seen show a beautiful result, silhouetted sprigs of grass and flowers against the white of the eggshells and bathed in natural dyesContinue reading “Chemistry in the Kitchen”

Until today, I’d never been to a grocery store so popular that I had to wait in line to get into the parking lot. Mental note: Next time we venture up to Caputo’s Fresh Market, pick an off time, if there is such a time for the Elmwood Park grocery. We’d been wanting to checkContinue reading “Did You Say Olive Bar?”

The kids had a performance today, so we missed an opportunity to see a screening of “Dirt: The Movie” at the Chicago Cultural Center. I hope I get another chance to see the documentary, which debuted at Sundance last year. Future Farmboy watched the trailer with me and seemed like he was really into it.Continue reading “Movie Digs Up the Dirt About Dirt”

In honor of St. Patrick’s Day today, I dug deep into our record collection to dust off an LP set that belonged to my grandfather. It’s a fantastic slice of history, “The Irish Uprising: 1916-1922.” Narrated by Charles Kuralt and recorded live in Dublin, tracks include songs by the Clancy Brothers, Tommy Makem, a SinnContinue reading “Easter 1916”

This is actually an IPA, but we Irished it up a bit:

All ag eyes are on an important seed engineering case involving sugar beets. Today a federal judge in San Francisco ruled against organic farmers who wanted an immediate ban on the planting of genetically modified sugar beets, which were engineered by Monsanto to resist the herbicide Roundup. The good news for organic farmers, who sayContinue reading “Shortage of Conventional Seed Forces Judge's Hand in Sugar Beets Case”

Just loved this piece in the Kansas City Star about how the country is in the grip of a goat shortage. I knew that demand for goat meat was on the rise. Increasing immigrant populations have been a boon to local farmers who have the space to grow meat goats and raise/slaughter them according toContinue reading “U.S. in Midst of Goat Shortage? Sounds Like an Opportunity”