Hello everyone! I'm Kathe, one of the new members at Sandhill Farm. My husband Michael and I arrived from Southwest Missouri in a U-Haul truck(something big enough to carry all our plants in)on February 11th. Susan came up from Columbia the following Monday. It's getting harder to fit all of us around the dining table since we are now ten adults and one child. I guess a boarding house reach will become a new membership requirement.

We have had a busy time since Stan last caught you up on our doings. We had our annual retreat starting on February 20th and lasting until February 26th. It was a time to get to know each other better, reaffirm our values, plan for the rest of the year, do some needed work projects and have fun. We got a lot done in our meetings, which were facilitated for us by Jeffrey from Dancing Rabbit. There is a great deal of energy for learning new skills, expanding our gardens, and developing new products to sell. It looks like it is going to be a very exciting year down here on the farm. We got some needed work done, such as cutting logs to inoculate with shitake mushroom spawn, cleaning out closets("Oh, that's where that was!"), and sorting the woodshop's monumental collection of screws and nails. The whole group did a land walk on part of our property. We went bowling in Memphis on Friday, the 22nd and we had a progressive party on Tuesday, the 26th. Each member picked out an activity and we moved around the property to do each one. We had a group sing, put together a group poem, did a mural, learned to play "goomey"(which involves an awful lot of rubber bands), had a treasure hunt, identified the various plants and trees growing around our main farmhouse, went for a walk together, crammed all of us into Chad's little room, and did a follow-the-leader back to the house. Our thanks to Dancing Rabbit for catering dinner for us on Retreat Saturday.

We've had a mess of birthdays the last few weeks. Michael's was on the fifteenth, Stan's was on the twentieth and Sol's was on the twenty seventh. We celebrated accordingly and now we are having to work off the extra calories. We had a visit from former Sandhill resident Alis, along with our friend Anna and her children. Anna came back the next day with her mother, Lou, and they did some more visiting and walked around the area with Gigi. We've been twice to dinner at Dancing Rabbit and hosted them once. They will be here again this week.

Laird arrived home from his travels in California, Arizona and Texas a few days before the retreat began. Stan, Michael and I attended the Missouri Organic Association/SPAN conference in Jefferson City on February 16th. Stan left for a sorghum conference in Bowling Green, Kentucky last Thursday and arrived home on Saturday night. He said the driving conditions were not much fun on the return trip and we were glad to have him back home in one piece.

Speaking of the snow, it has been the occasion for some of us to put the skis on and get out and about. Gigi and Chad both did so on Saturday, and Gigi went out again with Stan on Sunday. If the snow lasts a few days, I'm sure more folks will do the same. But Spring is just around the corner. Michael and Rebecca were seen plantings seeds in flats. Won't be long now.