Farm Fresh Beginnings
There really isn't a non-cliche way to describe how busy things have been the past couple of months. Farm life is a non-stop, action packed, thrill ride! Planning is a continuous chore, driving us to the point where we are struggling to find time. Project management is a good skill to have... With work and farm it's a 24/7 job ;)
Another cog in the machine of our lives is our exciting pregnancy! Our baby is growing so much! The end of February can't come soon enough. We want to meet the tiny person! We've tried very hard and for a long time to get to this stage in our lives. We've focused so much on getting to this point, now it's really here. It's really going to happen.
Over the next couple months we will be finishing the nursery, celebrating birthdays, Thanksgiving, ChillyDog, Christmas, and New Years. All before the baby arrives.
Since we're not finding out the gender, we're going with nice natural colors. Sage and other earth tones. I recently put the crib together and things started to set in for me. Also, looking at the awesome gifts we've been graciously given from friends and family brings reality rushing up.
Today I turn 32. Looking back on the last couple years is an interesting exercise. Seeing where we were and how our lives evolved into what it is now. The experience of moving out to the farm is already providing feelings of fulfillment. This morning, at 5:30, in 27 degree weather, I went out to check on the farm cats. Of course they weren't in the milk house, these cats give me new found respect for their feline brethren, but I made sure they had food and their water wasn't frozen. They were close, meowing for attention, but I couldn't see them in the dark. Their curiosity is spectacular. Always watching, questioning if they want to be apart of the action or just watch and wait to see what happens. Sign of intelligence? Or naivete?
Cut down all of the overgrowth surrounding the barn.
Chores on the farm are really picking up because of winter. We have two out buildings that we are offering for winter storage. We had to go through the town to obtain a conditional use permit, allowing us to provide the storage. Once we got the approval, clean out began. There were large amounts of miscellaneous items left behind that I needed to remove to provide the space.
Our fields have been neglected for several years. So much so that trees appear to have turned the fields into a forest landscape and tall weeds tangle throughout the fence lines. I'm currently working with someone to clear the fields, opening up the space and actually prepping it for use.
This brings us to one of the bigger decisions we're working on here on the farm. What does our future look like at the farm? What's our end goal? What's a good farm name?! Learning is a never ending game. There are endless options, which lie under a mountainous amount of methods and paths to achieve those goals.
Currently our principles and values are driving our future, and it feels right now more than ever. Jess and I are stressed and joyful, more than we ever have been before. But I think that it's this restart that has given us the ability to do start thinking about what we feel we're meant to be doing.