Farm memories. My grandparents lived on a farm just outside Spencer, Wis. I stayed with them every summer until I was old enough to prefer a boyfriend over a visit to Grandpa and Grandma Schultz's house. Funny thing is, I remember so much from my farm visits, while the boyfriends' names have been long forgotten.

The farm is where I had my first taste of sun-warmed raspberries, sprinkled with sugar and covered with fresh cream. Grandma helped me make a dress for my doll – on a treadle sewing machine! I loved to lock Grandpa in the hen house, and was always amazed at how fast he found his way out. I rode on the back of Dan, the big work horse, hanging on to the knobs on his collar for dear life, lest I fall off under the manure spreader he was pulling. I ate sweet peas fresh out of the garden, until I got so sick I couldn't move. I jumped off the hay loft into piles of fragrant hay, and swung on a rope across the width of the barn. I tried to make butter from fresh cream, but got tired of shaking the jar long before any lumps of butter appeared. I played with newborn kittens and watched a batch of baby pigs being born. I held baby chicks in my hands as they worked their way out of their shells. I slept on clouds of goose-down filled quilts and pillows.

Could those days at the farm be the reason I always look for a little Dutch boy cookie jar like the one that sat on Grandma's kitchen window sill, or a curved glass picture frame like the one that held my Daddy's baby picture? Why do I prefer "country" antiques over the other varieties?

Yep. No doubt about it. Those days made me a country girl at heart.

Do you have any farm memories that you would like to share? If you collect farm-related items, what are they?

Send your replies and comments to: Sandra Sparks, sandra.sparks@fwmedia.com, or via mail to Antique Trader Inbox, 700 E State St., Iola, WI 54945.

Or you can post a reply HERE on the Antique Trader blog, or HERE in the Antique Trader message boards.