Let Me Buy You A Beer

To say social media has changed my life would be an understatement.

It wasn’t the tools, the toys or the techie gadgets either.

It was you. The people, the relationships, the phone conversations and the visits IRL that really changed it.

Thank you.

In the near future I’ll be applying to a conference where I hope to meet some new folks who share my passion for social media, people, farming and food.

It’s a conference you might be interested in too, so I thought I’d share.

AgChat Foundation is hosting the third-annual Agvocacy 2.0 training in late August of this year. I went last year and I had a blast.

It’s one of those “perfect sized” conferences. You know what I’m talking about. It’s big enough to have great speakers and fun people, yet just small enough to really learn hands on information you can put to use that day.

Yes. I’m a fan.

To join the conference apply here. Send me a message on Facebook if your application is accepted. I’m always up for meeting new people and I’ll even buy you a beer if you make the contact.

How’s that for a little encouragement?

Real Friends Make You Work

If you’re my friend on Facebook or follow me on Twitter, you might have seen a few post over the weekend about my trip to Ohio and Tennessee. The fun filled, fact filled, flurry of a trip consisted of two major parts that came together perfectly.

You see, a few months earlier I had worked up a plan with my fascinating, intelligent {and slightly crazy} friend, Jennifer (Twitter) to fly into Ohio and hang out at her house for a day. The visit would work perfectly into my trip to Nashville for the 2011 AgChat Foundation Conference and give Jennifer a driving buddy to the conference.

The plan was perfect really-until I learned that “we” had an event on Saturday.

So, I did what all people do that hang out with Jennifer-I worked.

I just giggled typing that.

If you know Jennifer, you know why- don’t worry, she’s probably giggling too.

On with the story.

Jennifer picked me up Saturday around 2 p.m. at the Columbus International Airport and off we went to the Center of Science and Industry (COSI) for their annual Farm Day’s celebration . For those of you {like me} who are not from Ohio, COSI is a non-profit organization that works prepare children for success in school and in life. They have hosted Farm Days: Little Seeds and Big Tractors for seven years inside the Columbus downtown district.

The event included education centers, combines, tractors, games, animals for the kids to pet and tons of fun giveaways. It was a neat opportunity to see what’s being done in other states by farmers to reach out to children.

On the other hand, there was some pretty fun humor there, if you have a good since of humor.

Don’t we wish everyone would follow this rule?

If you don’t laugh at that, I feel sorry for you.

Just curious, what’s being done around your community to connect more of us city-folk to farmers?

We’ve All Got A Story

I ran across this video from Jan Hoadley of Slow Money Farm today while trying to learn more about Agchat Foundation’s Agvocacy 2.0 Conference.  Since attendance is only granted through an application process, I’ll keep my fingers crossed. With any luck, I’ll join Jan for #ACFC11 August 22-23 in Nashville, TN.

I’ve followed Jan on Twitter for some time now. She has all kinds of farm animals and shares a unique love for rabbits with another Twitter friend of mine, Kelly Rivard.

I love how she insists “we’ve all got a story” in this video.

Jan’s right you know, our stories provide a foundation for our lives and can even define our lives.

One day I’ll tell you the story of a city girl [lil ol' me] who met a dairy farmer. The experience changed my life forever and began my “story” in agriculture.

I’d like to think our stories in life are more alike than they are different, but I guess the jury’s still out on that one. Maybe the themes of our lives are more alike than the actual stories themselves?

Just curious, do you have a blog? If so, leave me a link in the comments below.  I’d love to learn more about your life and your story.

Wordless Wednesday- Meet Gator and Pete

Horses.

They’ve been an addiction for quite some time.

Like most addictions, they can be made worse when you spend time with others who share the same addiction. Unfortunately, the BEO {boyfriend} has the same addiction.

There’s more to this story and I promise to tell you more later – but, it’s Wordless Wednesday and this post is getting a bit wordy.