Farm Life

We have been trying to figure out a new direction for our lives for a while now. Back in 2007, the year after we got married, we bought a house with a hefty mortgage, filled it with lots of brand new furniture, purchased other big things like a vacation ownership and were very happy with living the American dream and increasing our net worth. Oh how things have changed. If only we knew then how we'd feel now but I suppose it's easy for hindsight to make you feel that way.

I, personally, am living my dream as a stay at home mom. I don't really care where or how we live as long as I can spend as much time as I can with my kid(s) during the crucial first 5 years. David, however, is not happy. He is a mechanical design engineer. He works a 40 hour week desk job and kind of hates it. The company itself is wonderful and he even feels it is a good place to work in the meantime but he would really love being more active, using his hands and no longer contributing to the "biggerism" (as The Lorax would call it) that we have been trying to step away from. He wants to look forward to and love the work he spends most of his life doing and I don't blame him at all. I fully support this quest of his and will go wherever it takes us, as long as I can continue to live my dream too (which luckily he is fully supportive of).  We've gone back and forth about all kinds of ideas from photography to vintage furniture restoration and now farming...

My family owns a small, very fertile, farm that is not currently used for much. Part of my inheritance is a lot of said land on which to do whatever I like. Our current plans? To eventually build!

Perhaps our future home!

Recently determined long term goal? To become full-time farmers :). With how much we love the outdoors, healthy, wholesome food, being active, being together, and with having such great land at our disposal, it seems to be a great fit.

Step 1 will be to sell our house and find out what will thrive best on our land (which crops, livestock, etc). Step 2 will be to live somewhere very cheap, if not free (ie. with family) for a year or two, with David staying at his current job, while we pay off the rest of our debt, save as much as we can and start small scale farming on the side to get a feel of whether or not it can be successful . Wow, debt freedom! Step 3, become full-time farmers and build our home on our property.

There it is in three easy steps! Haha, if only it really were that easy. In all seriousness, this is a huge and scary leap and we won't make it too quickly or lightly. Our top priority is making sure our family is taken care of but if we have as good as free (we will have to pay my parents $1 according to a grandfather clause) land available and this scenario covers several facets that we are passionate about, why not go for it??

It was great to spend time as a family on the farm. Ayden met my brother-in-law's horses for the first time.

We played on the swing set.

And had a great visit with my dad (my mom is still at the dance competition).

We sure have a lot to think about but so far this seems to be the most realistic change we can make without going too crazy. I'm sure this topic will come up again in future posts so be on the lookout!

Any farmers out there?  What are the pros and cons to the lifestyle?

~Sarah