New Year - New Opportunities

As I say goodbye to 2015 and move into 2016, my heart is filled with hope.  The past year has been extremely difficult - health problems, living 400 miles from the DH and the critters for an entire year, moving a farm 400 miles with winter threatening, squeezing the contents of a 2600 square foot house (and four large dogs) into a 1700 square foot house built in 1905.  But now 2016 presents a world of opportunities for us and I can't wait to get started. Change is powerful.  It is uncomfortable and often frightening, but it is also transforming.  I am excited to see where it takes us!

In December 2014, we made the difficult decision to move.  We knew it was likely to be a losing proposition from a real estate perspective, but we knew business opportunities would always be limited where we were.  I was tired of the long cold winters and the short summers.  I didn't want to live 3 hours from the closest amenities or equine veterinary care anymore.  Although where we lived was strikingly beautiful with unlimited outdoor recreation opportunities, the stress of my job and trying to eek out a living there made life extremely difficult.  We needed a change and when the opportunity presented itself, we really had to take it.

The move took a total of 9 months.  As the house lingered on the market with no offers - even after two price reductions, I began to lose hope that we would ever escape.  I had to move for work so DH was stuck taking care of the farm, trying to keep the failing house in 'showing shape' and still find time to work.  I moved into a 400 square foot isolated cabin with just the basic amenities and a lot of arachnid roommates.  On a positive note, I had lots of time and motivation to train for my first sprint triathalon which I completed (in 2 hours!) in July.  This was a major accomplishment for me as I was diagnosed in October 2014 with exercise induced asthma and an over-reactive respiratory system - basically I suck at breathing and any kind of irritant (smoke, dust, etc) or exertion causes a reaction.

We finally accepted a very low offer on our home and were so fortunate to find 44 acres of heaven to purchase.  It was late September - we had no money or time to build a house - so we bought a little house in town to hunker down in for the winter.  The chickens live in the backyard, the dogs are crowded and not big fans of all the 'town noise', most of our things are in storage - but we are all in one place.  Winter was coming so hay had to be bought and secured, a well had to be dug, fence installed, water lines buried and stock tanks installed.  Thankfully, fall lingered on enabling us to construct all the critical infrastructure.  It's a little inconvenient to drive 30 miles roundtrip to feed horses twice a day but we are managing.

And now - the wheel of the Earth is turning, bringing us into a new year and new opportunities.  I am bursting with excitement over the many ideas and choices for our blank canvas of land.  Which brings me to the point of all of this!  With all the cool things we plan to accomplish in the upcoming years to turn our bare ground into a self-sustaining farm - I thought - heck!  I should start an online blog to share our experiences good and bad.  Our new website is under construction - the blog will be located at www.ourprairiefarm.com.  We will have stories of our adventures, gardening tips, recipes, pitfalls we encounter, solar energy, sustainability - who knows what will end up there.  I really hope you will join us on our journey!  I think it will be fun and there will be interesting tidbits of information that you may find useful.  Let's GO!