Well hello, friends!
Long time no.. read?
It has been a busy summer. We’ve been caring for chickens, training the puppy, and tending the garden.
We’ve been back at school for a month. I am still homeschooling these babies that aren’t babies anymore. Chloe is in 7th grade and joined the church youth group. I don’t even know how that’s possible. Addi is in 5th grade. Harper is in 2nd grade.
At some point in September, my younger sister came to visit. I told her she should pack her tent and camp out with us. Her exact words were “I am not camping in the rain.” Don’t worry, there’s a 0% chance of rain. It rained all night on us. I’m also convinced a train conductor had way too much fun with his horn in the middle of the night. haha! But, we all had so much fun. My parents came over for dinner. We had the most incredible double rainbow (can only see one above) and sunset. We cooked a big breakfast the next morning with farm fresh eggs, bacon, toast.. all of the good stuff. My heart was so full. When we moved out here, I prayed that God would fill it with tons of family, friends, and LIFE. We’ve been successful.
Scott and I took over leading our small group so that our current leaders could take a period of rest. We hosted our small group for a “cookout”. We had Taco Friday and ate outside.
We’ve hiked about 27 miles this year. It’s way under what our goal was, but we’ve been busy on the farm. Ranger has turned out to be the best addition to the farm. He’s so loyal and well behaved, for a pup. He hikes and camps like a champ. We love this furry guy.
This may be the most memorable part of the month. HA! I met a friend at the park for a playdate. Harper came running over to get a drink of water and tripped. She’s such a tough girl. She didn’t cry, but she lost ALL of her color. Her lips even went white and her hand was shaking. Sure enough, she sustained a buckle fracture to her radius right above her wrist. She’s in a hard short-arm cast for 6 weeks. I found a way to make it sparkly, so she is happy.
I figured that I should get back into this space. The weather has cooled off dramatically. Fall is here. The garden is slowing down tremendously, and I am thankful. We’ve worked hard this year, and I’m really looking forward to the rest that comes in the winter. We are already planning our 2023 garden. We’re expanding again. We learned a LOT of lessons this year. Back in July, we got the C word after serving during VBS. I knew it would happen, and had prepared to have things ready. The garden was neglected for several days, and blight took over our tomato plants. We ended up pulling nine total plants because of it. Our tomato harvest was sad. But, we have so much squash stored away for winter, many jars of jam, and lots of pickled banana peppers. Every little bit counts when it comes to food storage.
We should be gearing up for our trip to Virginia for the Homesteaders of America conference. We had to make the decision to cancel our trip when we learned that the whole bottom of our van is broken. We decided to buy a new (to us) van. If you’ve had to do any sort of car shopping this year, I’m so sorry. It was ROUGH and made me sick. I know it’s not going to get any better any time soon. The dealer parking lots are empty. So, now we have a (hopefully) reliable van. Lord willing, it will last us for many MANY more years.
If you didn’t know, I’m over on instagram. My blog page can be found here. I post regularly over there and would love to have you follow along.
