As Nevada Farm Bureau's Young Farmer's and Rancher's We Are the Voice of Agriculture

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Ag in the Classroom--Time to Pick a Book!

It is that time of year when iam supposed to have an idea of what great book or books we want to use for our Ag Lit Project this coming spring.  I have lists from AFBF that show books that are approved by the Farm Bureau as Accurate Agriculture Books, because, let's face it, we don't want to teach them things that aren't truce or accurate like many of the books floating around the world are when it comes to portraying agriculture.


Our goal is to help kids, whether rural, urban, or suburban, to learn about the important role that agriculture plays to all of us on a daily basis.  A new book out, PIGS& PORK:IN THE STORY OF AGRICULTURE, is one that we are looking at, along with it's counterpart for younger grades, Pigs an A-Z Book.  I think this could be a great time to share these books because of the scare last year with the "SWINE" flu (I say that  name with disgust) and maybe, as we get into the schools and better teach the kids, they can in turn take it home to their parents and families.  Last year our books covered a dairy cow and the process of milk from start to finish, along with a  book about farm equipment.  Those books were aged for 1st-3rd grade, while these are 3rd-6th, and Pre-K-1st. 

One of the big books this year that was being pushed quite heavily by the Ag Foundation, was by the same authors about Soybeans, which is great, but we want to cover as much as we can that is relative to Nevada Agriculture before we start into areas that aren't really in production here in our state.  

IF you have the time to click on the links and check out the books, I always love feedback, also, where or not you would be interested in both books, or which grade level you would rather have being taught in your counties grade schools!

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Lincoln County Farm Bureau 4th of July BBQ


Well, here I am trying to catch up as usual! 
Since I am a member of the Lincoln County Farm Bureau, and each year we have a fundraiser dinner on the 4th of July in Caliente, I thought I would share it with all of you.  These are some of the pictures of that evening.  I would love to share happenings of lots of other county's Farm Bureau's and their YF&R's, so if anyone ever has anything going on and wants to share the event and/or pic's--let me know!!


Our State Vice-President, Paul Mathews, is also from Lincoln county, and one of our chief dutch-oveners, along with Lincoln County President, Bevan Lister, and Lincoln VP, Lee Mathews.  Mmmm, can you see how good those potatoes were?

The Deep-Pit Pig!!
Lee Mathews got roped into preparing the deep-pit pig and then spending the day cooking it.  He did an AWESOME job, we were all impressed!  And, yes, that is him wearing the protective coat in Caliente on July 4th--amazing what our Farm Bureau members are willing to do!!


Too bad I couldn't add smell to the blog--you'd all be ready to eat!!


Lee's brother, Dann Mathews, was there helping him with the pig, and my husband Grant came along to help them with the taste-testing.... ;)


Rose Park in Caliente was recently renovated with a great new gazebo and also has areas for dutch-ovening and deep-pitting.
Okay, now I am making myself hungry again!  Those are just about perfect.

It wouldn't be dutch-ovening without the COBBLER!
Well, this was actually the last one--as you can see to the top, the apple went almost as fast as the chocolate/cherry and the peach ones.  The only one I really got a picture of was the blueberry/cherry, which was the only one I really got a taste of, either.  Which was probably for the best, or I might have waddled home.

Well, we had a great time, and a great dinner, next year we have a few things to work on--like our advertising, so we can get a better turn out.  We tend to flucuate each year with turn-out, but with the parade and fireworks being the next night and the Senior Citizens doing a Luau dinner/fundraiser the same night, we didn't have a 'great' turn out, but we sure thought those who turned out were GREAT!