30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 9

Day 9- The Best of Both Worlds

This is a photo of my dad and my husband taken this fall.   I'm not sure there is another photo in existence with just the two of them in it.  They represent the two sides of my world.

I've talked about growing up on Main Street in town and moving out to the country when I married my husband.  That just touches the tip of the ice-berg on the differences in my past and my present.  Here's another little piece.

Dad was in upper management at a company in the big town.  For as long as I can remember, he wore a suit to work every day and arrived home between 5:30-6:00 pm. every night.  He sat at a desk and used a computer and had one of those honking big phones with the thing to prop it up on your shoulder.  That was before they invented headsets I guess.  

I remember visiting him in his office and being proud of him.  He had a secretary and a big rolley chair that he always sat in with one leg kind of up under him or something goofy like that (which I thought was cool too.)  He had an extension for heaven's sake!  Now he is retired and I haven't seen him in a suit in years come to think of it!

Dad hung out in the garage or the yard at night after work.  He was always fixing and pruning and tinkering.  He was never one to be inside!  He was always home for supper and often fixed it for my sister and I.  He was King of the Crock pot!

Fast forward to after college when I married the hard-core farmer who wears jeans and t-shirts and work boots everyday to work.  You mean a tie isn't necessary on a combine?  He doesn't fix his hair or have a fancy pen. I married a farmer who can seriously never ever tell me when he will be home.  And if he does tell me when he will be home, he's  wrong 90% of the time. Things come up, I get it now.... I married a farmer who gets out of the door in the morning like a animal freed from it's cage.  I married a farmer who's job never ends at 5:00 and who has never, ever, ever, ever TINKERED! Talk about polar opposites. It took some getting used to, but I think all these years later I get it.

I have to get up early to chat.  I try to stay up late to catch up with him on life's happenings.  We go ahead and eat supper without him.  I don't wait until the last minute to load the kiddos in the car to go somewhere in hopes that he will show up to wash faces, smooth hair, find lost shoes and the like.  I load and go.  If he gets in as I pull out of the garage in his dusty boots, I smile and hand him a change of clothes and pull on out. (and if you don't believe that, just ask him, always a smile from me, never a frown. ever.)  If he doesn't make it into the car, well, I go it alone. 

I'm thankful for his work ethic (though I'm afraid he's going to wear himself out by age 40!) I'm thankful for his passion and drive. I'm thankful for all the "farmer" in him.  I'm thankful that his temperament comes straight from his grandpa who farmed this ground and lived in this house. I'm thankful he is who he is.  It's just different than the typical town life I had known and loved for 20 some years.  

I don't know which lifestyle I prefer and I don't think I need to decide. I believe I'm where I'm supposed to be with a wonderful man who loves me, doing a job he believes in.  My goal is to be his support, his helper. It's still a juggle to figure out just where I fit into the family farming way of life, but I believe in trying to sprout where you are planted and I keep trying. 

I'm thankful for my towny upbringing with my dad (I love you Dad!  Thanks for all your raising!)  and I'm thankful for my farming adult-life.  Different is good.  Life is good.

But hey babe, think maybe you can be home by 5 tomorrow?  Maybe fix supper, text Dad, he's got a great beef stew recipe!?  Possibly? 

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30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 8

Day 8-Sharing the love of the farm

 

Every year we have a celebration of harvest and a time to fellowship together with all of the guys that help us with harvest and all of their wives and kids.  The guys are NEVER all in the same place during the harvest season, as they each have their job and they are going many different directions at all hours of the day and night, tooling away to finish the work. 

We love getting everyone together and just hanging out for a few hours.  This idea came from a farm-wife/speech therapist friend of mine.  They have done a version of this celebration on their farm for years and we decided it was such a great idea, that we adopted it and adapted it to our style. 

This get-together not only is great for all of the families to meet each other (as our crew changes a little each year) but we hang out and laugh and reminisce about the hard work and the long hours and the funny stories that are bound to happen throughout the season.  Another little part of the dinner is the opportunity to share our farm and the love of the farm life with the kids of the guys that work for us.  You know, John Deere Love isn’t just for traditional farm folk.  John Deere Love is everywhere! Good heavens with the number of true farm kids these days, poor old Deere would be out of business!!  All little boys (and girls in our case) light up when they see the traditional green and yellow!

These photos are from several years ago when we went all out!  We had a take home craft of corn and bean “sand art” and we made a farm coloring book (orange) that was personalized to our farm.  We also showed the beloved movies “All About John Deere” on a little TV.    The hit of the night was the kiddie pool full of corn and scooping toys.  Kids young and old spent a lot of time in this area!This is kind of an awful picture of these two normally adorable kids.  I had to include it because it shows their FARM PRIDE.  We made them logo coats for the night and they proudly wore them and shared their farm life with all the farm loving kids that have shared  their daddies with our farm for awhile during the harvest season!  This is my niece and daughter when they were a few years younger. muwah!   

We are getting ready to have another Harvest Celebration and I will post some pictures of that.  The kid corner probably won’t be as extensive, but we are sure to have a great time.  Our family is so incredibly thankful for all of our hard-working guys that make harvest possible.  There is no way my hubby, his brother and their dad could bring in the crop and do the fall work all by themselves and we are so thankful for our guys and their families! 

Have a wonderful day and county your blessings! 

Feel free to comment….I have it set to moderate the comments, which is a little bit of a pain, but I thought that would be a good way to get started.  I know from emails and comments “in town” that people are reading and I would love to hear your stories of farm love and blessings.  Thanks for reading!

 

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30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 7

Day 7-Point of View

 

I’m thankful to look out my window in the morning and see this….

and this…..

and this…..corn everywhere, beans on the rest.  We started our marriage in a house up a long lane in a farm house about 5 miles away from the main farm.  It was quiet there.  We had a fields all around our house and the best darn Amish neighbors we could ask for.  But there, the only person who really ever dropped by was the UPS man.  That was getting a little expensive just to have company!  I am kidding!  However, it was an out-of–the-way location and the few days a year they farmed around our house were treasured!  When our oldest was about to enter kindergarten we had the opportunity to (or we begged his family for the chance to) move to the main farm.  Corn fields are awesome.  Solitary lives are great.  Quiet is important. But it was a bit much for this “Main Street” girl to handle.  I needed a little more action.  I grew up in the center of town, next to the Dairy Bar.  People cruised. We walked. We had lots of company. We visited our neighbors. We hung out on the porch (or the roof out my bedroom window, right guys?) and watched the action.  So as a grown up, I was kinda lonely for some action with two little kids out in the middle of boon docks and husband who may as well been 30 miles away for 15 hours a day. Watching the corn grown and the snow melt was B-O-R-I-N-G!

Now that we live on the main farm, not only do I see corn and beans and timber when I look out my kitchen window, I’m liable to see a truck driver warming up his rig.  Steam rolling out and him smiling at me as I pour my coffee!  I usually see the guys on a gator or golf cart hauling parts and seed and dragging… whatever the heck they are working on around our house over to the shop or the barn.  There are always people here.  Always action.  Our home sits in the middle of a circle drive that is crawling with activity most all of the time. 

Even though the working guys NEVER come in to share a cup of coffee,  and people still don’t really “drop-in” to chat (though I seriously wish they WOULD!) I’m just comforted by the action and the life out the window.  It’s kind of like living on Main Street.  Only this time it’s Kenworths, not Cameros.  It’s lunchboxes not ice cream cones.  But it works for me and I’m thankful!

  

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30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 6

Day 6-USA

I technically still have two hours to meet my goal of blogging every day.  Yes, first thing in the morning would be best, but I’m full of good intentions and my days are full of a job and my nights are full of ball games and ninjitsu lessons and music lessons and laundry.  Let’s not forget the laundry.  So forgive me that I’m posting in the evening. 

Last winter, Justin traveled to China and India to learn about agriculture in other countries.  Today, on election day 2012, I am thankful to live on a farm in the USA. Each year on the Saturday before July 4th, our town has a huge celebration including a parade. Last year our family of five entered our miniature horse and cart.  Picture: little pony, little cart, 5 people, 104 degrees.  It worked out fine, but it was a little nerve wracking considering the horse had never seen the city limits.  Not to mention heard a siren or walked down a packed street with people waving flags and throwing candy.

This year the 4H group put together an entry.  This was the brain child of my oldest.  She kinda likes pigs.

Our friends like goats, but that was too hard, so they decorated their golf cart USA/4H!

     And our Boy Scout Troop did too.Our Boy Scouts had an entry too.   What says USA more than a rack wagon full of toothy, sweaty boys sporting the Cub Scout Blues and waving flags? Those are my blondie boys in the middle.

We are proud to wave our flag in the Fourth of July Parade and we pray often for our country.  We pray for the future we are leaving for our children.  We pray that whatever man is elected as President, he is able to make wise decisions.  We are hopeful. We are a proud American Farm Family.

 

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Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 5

Day 5-A SHOP

About seven years ago we got a ginormous gift.  Nope, I’m not talking about this adorable brown-eyed blondie. I’m talking about the opportunity to build a heated shop on our farm. At that time, I didn’t live on the farm, but lived 5 miles away in a little farm house that was away from all of the action, therefore I didn’t realize the gravity of building a heated shop. 

I had, on numerous occasions seen my hubs and his dad, laid out on the gravel under equipment.  I had seen them washing equipment in all sorts of weather.  I had seen them in the snow and cold have to do all kind of things that made me glad NOT TO BE  A FARMER!  Mostly because I hate the cold!  Don’t get me started on the horrible memories of sledding as a child.  Maybe my mom didn’t dress me right, but good gravy it was awful!  The guys however, never seemed to mind or complain.

I do know that when this shop was completed, their lives changed a great deal.  Now they can wash equipment in the relative heat of the shop, they can pull a semi over a big pit, go down the steps of the pit and turn the light on and work on the underbelly without frozen wrists or rain in their face or gravel in their hind ends. 

This shop is a game changer you could say.

They still have to work out in the elements, they still have to get wet and dirty and they still have to work long, hard hours, but at least some of their work can be done in a better environment and I know they are thankful for that. 

Now let’s get to the Farmer’s Wife part of this story… this shop has been a blessing to our family in many ways!  I mean, who can turn 5 and have a cowgirl party inside in the middle of a snowstorm in January?  My girl can!

We had hay bales and a pretend fire!  Twenty some kids were there with plenty of room to blow off some winter steam. Yee-to-the-haw! See that boy in the middle, with the adorable little Wrangler jeans on?  For the love, those cheeks!

   Her farmer dad and grandpa helped corral cowgirls and cut pink cake.  The steel workbench doubled as a gift table, the Snap-On chest was the coat holder.  It was a down right success of a party and we had 20 sweaty cowpoke after the hay treasure hunt and the roping contest! 

Because of the heated shop, each cowgirl even got a chance to ride…..a REAL LIVE PONY!  He’s a miniature horse actually, but they all called poor Shrinky Dink a pony and most giggled as they got a photo taken in front of the semi which doubled as a corn field backdrop. 

 

Since then, our shop has served as the locale of various other parties, dinners as well as middle of the winter campground and  bike racetrack.  It allows the kiddos to hang with their dad, uncle and grandpa while they are working.  It allows us a place to play a family pick-up game of basketball and it allows us to be together and enjoy our life here on the Family Farm, just a little bit more! 

 

Yee Haw for heated shops and pink ostrich crepe soled boots.  Life on the farm…just as it is!

 

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30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 4

Day 4-Playground Equipment

 

We actually own a swing set.  We own a sandbox or two as well.  We own a million balls, pogo sticks, soccer goals and the like.  But this my friends, is the one of the most popular pieces of playground equipment we own.  It’s a hopper bottom for a semi.  The corn goes in from the top via auger wagon and it gets dumped out the bottom of the trailer into a pit or an auger that takes the corn into the bin or the elevator.

What’s totally irresistible to the 6-7 year old boy set is that it is slick as snot-on-a-popsicle on the inside! AND…. it’s slanty!  So if you take off your shoes and you are wearing a nice soft pair of sweat pants you can spend all day climbing up and sliding down the hoppers.  When you are tired with sliding down the front half, you move on back and slide around on the back. 

This makes for really dirty sweatpants and socks that need to be pitched.  It didn’t take me long to learn, when the semi is parked in the shed and I can’t find the boys after repeatedly calling them, ringing the dinner bell and giving our signature “whoop whoop” call, then I should climb my hiney up into a hopper bottom where I’m likely to find a couple of really dirty, but really happy little boys.  Life on the farm, you can’t beat it with a stick.

 

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30 Days of Thankfulness-Day 3

Day 3-HELP!!!

Okay, so go to my FACEBOOK page and “like the page.” When you do that, you’ll get a link in your newsfeed each time I post, so if you care to read my ramblings, you won’t get behind:)

We have THE BEST people that help us on our farm.  I am so incredibly thankful for the crazy hours they put in to harvest and plant the crop and to do all the junk in between.  Yes, they get paid for their hours, but it’s an insane time commitment to work with this family and I’m glad we have such a great crew that chooses to come back year after year.  I just may have to post about some more of them in the days to follow.  This is the photo I came to first, so you win boys.

Now these two, I’m especially thankful for.  These two are my brothers.  It’s so incredibly nice for the Green Family to take them on and let them work here on our farm and you know what…they get to do WHATEVER THEY WANT, because they go with me, which makes them family!

IF YOU BELIVIE the above, you would not be the first.  These two guys are life long friends of my husband.  They grew up here in our small town with the hubs.  THEY ARE NOT MY BROTHERS.  Several years ago there was a rumor going around within the crew that they were my brothers and that’s why they got their dinners first or something like that.  We all have chuckled about this mishap for several years now.  When you are around these two, you are ALWAYS chuckling about something, anything actually. They are really sumpthin’! They are one of a kind (well, two of a kind.)

These two actually are brothers, if you haven’t noticed, they are twins.  They both have off farm jobs and pretty hefty civic duties in our town.  Let me brag a minute about my bros…one is Mayor and one is Park Board President. Somehow they find time on weekends and weeknights during the busy season to help us farm.  They love to work and their kids do too! One of their sons knows more about our semi line-up than I do (though that’s not really anything to brag about) but this kid is really schooled in the world of Heritage Farms Semi fleet! I’m very thankful for the relationship our family has with these two and their families!

Sometimes family isn’t defined by blood, but by love!  Love ya Bros!

(That looks really weird in print. Let’s try it this way)…thanks guys for being great guys with great wives and fantastic kids that we can’t imagine life without.  

Geesh, sappy, but it’s a thankfulness post right?  I’m thankful.

 

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