Inside Standish

Western Maine Champs

The Bonny Eagle High School varsity football team is this year’s 2013 Western Maine Football Champions and will be playing Cheverus High School for the state title Saturday, Nov. 23, at Fitzpatrick Stadium in Portland.

Project Graduation Crop Results

The scrapbooking crop event/fundraiser was held at Bonny Eagle High School on Saturday, Nov. 16, and was a huge success. They had 118 people participate and raised over $5,000! A fantastic job to all who worked so hard to make it happen.

New Organic Farm in Town

With the closing of Rippling Waters, Julee Applegarth who worked and managed there for 18 years, is starting her own farming enterprise. It’s “just up the river” she tells Rippling Waters customers when they ask – actually it is at 33 Florence Lane in Steep Falls with Saco River frontage. Julee and her husband, Mike Foster, plan on growing an acre of annual vegetable crops, selling primarily to the Steep Falls community in the traditional Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) share manner and at a local farmers’ market. With land of hill and dale, woods and fields, dry spots and wet spots, they will diversify into other products like mushrooms, berries, organic eggs, and organic poultry. They are erecting a greenhouse, and will grow organic seedlings for plant CSAs and winter greens.

For other value-added items, they will grow natural dye plants for fiber farmers, creating natural dye kits for home projects, and creating craft items made from their dye plants and local fiber. Another potential craft for sale will be earrings made with their own chickens’ molting feathers and their own manufactured wild cherry wood beads. With a kitchen license the line of Applegarth Assortments like cover crop cookies, rhubarb brownies, tomato-garlic bread, jalapeno salsa and multi-colored pepper jam will be made. Educational events like home-school garden class, spring wild edibles walk, wild mushroom walk, “Growing Shittakes,” plant spirit workshops, and Kale Fest are planned throughout the year.

To learn more about their plans and projects, or to order a share, check out Sweet Relief Farm on Facebook, call 675-3410 or email julee@sweetrelieffarm.

Christmas in the Country Craft Fair

Crafters from all over New England will gather on Friday, Nov. 29, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Saturday, Nov. 30, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., for the 41st Annual Christmas in the Country Craft Fair. The fair takes place at Bonny Eagle High School, located at 700 Saco Road in Standish.

The Christmas in the Country Craft Fair features exclusively handmade crafts including jewelry, ceramics, stained glass, paintings, ornaments, candles, quilts, specialty foods, and much, much more! The fair is sponsored by the Trustees of the Old Red Church in Standish and serves as the organization’s largest fundraising event. All proceeds from the fair support the maintenance of The Old Red Church and school programs, including scholarships awarded to Bonny Eagle High School seniors.

Steep Falls Holiday Fair

The Steep Falls Holiday Fair is Saturday, Nov. 23, from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. at the Steep Falls Elementary School on Boundary Road. Vendors will have their goods for sale along with a bake sale, hot dogs, soup, chili, hot cocoa and coffee. Santa will be making an appearance at 10 a.m. to have hot cocoa with the kids.

Village Master Plan Update

The second meeting of the Steep Falls Village Master Plan & Implementation Committee was scheduled to be held Thursday, Nov. 21.

A few things to share at this time are that all future committee general meetings will be televised on Saco River Community TV Channel 5 for those that are interested but cannot attend. In the near future, the committee will be looking for input from the citizens of Standish and will be using keypad voting at a few visioning public hearings. We will keep you posted on the dates as those hearings have yet to be scheduled.

The engineering firm of Wright-Pierce has created a website that is going to make all of the information from the Steep Falls meetings available to the public. The address to this site is http://www.wright-pierce.com/standish.aspx. Here you can learn about the background of the project, the people to contact, upcoming meetings, public hearings and forums. Information about the Sustain Southern Maine Steep Falls pilot area program can be accessed here as well or you can visit that site directly at http://sustainsouthernmaine.org/pilot-communities/standish-steep-falls/.

Sunrise Corner, located at 15 Ossipee Trail West, is celebrating its 10th year in the Schoolhouse, 15th year in the 1810 Antique House and 22nd year of opening for the public with “Christmas in the Country.” This year’s open house will be held Thanksgiving weekend, all day Friday, Nov. 29 through Sunday, Dec. 1.From left, Dylan and Stowe Watters from Limington Wild Folks Farm help Sweet Relief Farm erect hoops for their greenhouse.