-posted by Jayne

This post is in recognition of our employee Maggie Hovermale, who was recently awarded the FFA National Winner, Agricultural Processing, Entrepreneurship, 2015.  

Yeah, she's sort of a big deal.  :-)

On October 30th we traveled to Louisville, KY to watch Maggie prepare for her final presentation in competition for this national award.  While we were there, we got to walk around the entire FFA convention.  It's huge!   What does one find at an FFA convention, you ask?   T-shirts.  Lots of T-shirts with FFA logos and and agricultural promo items.

Blue jackets for miles and miles....

Blue jackets shopping for FFA T-shirts...

FFA t-shirts pledging love and support for the blue jacket....

Escalators filled with blue jackets from around the United States.  Manly FFA men doing push-ups in the lobby.

Isaac got up close and personal with a live snake from the Sea World exhibit.

Ohio FFA represents with a booth detailing the importance of Ohio agriculture.

Did you know the blue jacket is still manufactured in OHIO?

My favorite booth was the Wisconsin cheese sampling booth (pictured below).  I had the best coffee cheese I ever tasted.  Yes, it was cheese covered with coffee grounds.  Delicious!  I wish I had remembered to write down the brand.

We looked all over for the booth about HONEYBEES.  After all, about one-third of the human diet comes from insect pollinated plants, and the honeybee is responsible for 80 percent of that pollination, according to the USDA.

Ah, yes.  There they were.  At the Bayer Bee Care Center booth.  A bit ironic.  But I won't get into that now.   You can refresh your memory by looking at some of our old blog posts detailing how we feel about Bayer.    

For now, we'll just keep things light and happy.  Because we're proud of Maggie and her public-speaking skills.  We're proud of how she has represented Honeyrun Farm and Westfall FFA.  And she has earned a great honor.

You can catch Maggie this Saturday at the North Market Farmer's Market from 8-2.  Or, you can come see us at our first annual Holiday Open House, here at the farm from 9 am - 5 pm.  We'll have free cookies and hot cider, and lots of gifts available for purchase.  Hope you can come join us!