The Four of Us

Our story is a love story, of the city mouse and the country mouse. Let me explain...

My husband, Rob, believes that camping is staying at a Super 8 and believes dirt is a four letter word. He is very organized and structured. Rob was the cute little child picking flowers out on the soccer field and the man who brings an inflatable mattress when tent camping. Okay, okay, I know you have a mental picture. Now think of an anonym for everything you just read and that is me. I am a life-time Girl Scout, have been camping since I was weeks old and was taught to "not say yuck until I tried it". Right now you are probably wondering, "How and why could they get married?" Long answer: I honestly believe we balance each other out and force each other to grow and change for the better. Short answer: It's rough.

Rob and I have been blessed with two absolutely perfect little children that have rocked our worlds to the core. Ayla is just three and Bram turns four months this week.

As you can see my dear Ayla is a bit of a genetic mystery. She has blond hair and the most gorgeous icy blue eyes. She is also tall and skinny, just like her mom. Ha! I only wish. Currently, she is all about gardening like Mom and Dad. She carries an empty jelly jar around that she has stuffed with dirt, twigs and grass and then filled with water. She leaves it out in the sun and tells anyone that will listen that she is growing sunflowers. Ayla has a very gentle soul. The other week when my mother was staying with us, Ayla found two baby Robins that had been killed by an untimely fall from their nest. After realizing that they couldn't be helped she was adamant that they needed to go to heaven so they could be with Popop and Ruby (her fish). So she and my mom picked them up and buried them by my roses. Unfortunately, now every time we find something that has died, it has to go to heaven also. June bugs, mice, bats, spiders, flowers... you name it, it has to go to heaven. Quite frankly, I'm tired of burying things.

I have a feeling that for all of the raw emotion and outstanding imagination that Ayla has, Bram is going to be her opposite. He is just the happiest baby I have ever been around. He is at the perfect age where seeing me makes him overjoyed and his sister is the coolest person on the planet. When I stick out my tongue he promptly sticks out his. His best friends are the ceiling fan and his left fist that is always being chomped on. Strangers can't help but fall in love and of course I am told daily that he will be playing football for the Huskers soon. He is a big boy, so I'll give them that.

I hope you had fun meeting my family. I hope to be able to introduce my extended farm family to you really soon. Tomorrow we are visiting a local dairy goat farm to look at two potential females that could be our newest addition. I am so excited I am squealing like a little child!

"Land!"

Yesterday, my family and I visited Homestead National Monument and viewed four very special pieces of paper. When President Lincoln signed these papers in May of 1862, he was making it possible for any adult to own 160 acres of wilderness west of the Mississippi. The cry, "Free Land!", quickly spread through the east and while it may not be free today, I have always felt that cry deep in my soul.

On April 29, 2011, my husband and I became the proud owners of just over five and a half acres of farm land. We are located west of Lincoln, Nebraska on land carved out of an original 160 homestead plot. Our property consists of a two-story farmhouse with 100 year old wallpaper in every room, a large red barn completed in 1889, a cob house and a garage with an old summer kitchen attached. We currently have a small paddock fenced in and another two and a half acres put to seed. I also have a half acre garden in the works this spring with everything from Yukon potatoes to swiss chard growing.

I have always dreamed of rich, organic garden beds and bountiful harvests of veges and fruits. I've imagined fat, busy chickens scratching under my kitchen window and my children riding their pony around in the yard. The reality is that these dreams take more hard work and growth than I could ever have imagined! I am writing this blog so we can look back and reflect on our accomplishments and failures. I also hope some day my children can read this and be proud of their parents' courage and blind faith in themselves and eachother. But in the end, if while you relax on your patio drinking a cool beverage and surfing the internet, stumble upon my blog and chuckle at our dirt covered and manure filled escapades I will have succeeded.