I’m sitting down at my computer at the end of October while the rain falls outside, the clouds cover the sun and the leaves are falling from the trees. The end of the month is always a good time to reflect – and these little farmhouse updates have given me the opportunity to do so.
In 2020 when life feels so redundant at times, these little updates have given me the opportunity to really look back and treasure the moments that did happen.
Welcome to my farmhouse.
The end of the summer meant my last batch of tomatoes came out of the garden. I had a lot that never turned red. I don’t know what that’s about. But all in all – I LOVE gardening and we’ve already expanded the garden (by 100%!) for next year.
In September we dove right into homeschooling both of the boys. Our school offered an in-school hybrid option (it’s now full time) or a homeschool option. Since one of my boys likes consistency in the schedule and the other didn’t want to wear a mask we decided to go with the homeschool option.
I am not meant to homeschool my children.
We tried it. We’re good now. However, we are really loving the flexibility it has provided. The boys have to complete a number of units each week but it’s on our own time – which we appreciate. While the curriculum is provided by an Ohio company, my boys have their teachers grading it, so we feel connected to the school. They’ve also been able to continue to be involved in their extracurriculars at school. We committed to the fall semester, but we’re all looking forward to going back in January.
Speaking of flexibility. We took a long weekend trip to Gettysburg in September. After our South Dakota vacation as a family, you could say that I had the travel bug. Instead of waiting until next summer, we planned a trip now because – the kids were homeschooling!
We were able to locate my great-great-great Uncle who died in Gettysburg, fighting for the Union. We took a carriage ride to learn all the history. It was amazing. Would you like a detailed trip itinerary as I did for South Dakota?
Our big project was our lean-to barn. Years ago we took down our old barn which still makes me sad. The barn left was a lean-to that’s been there since 1950ish. I hated how it looked but building something new is just not in the budget. We found some local Amish to come and fix it up to look better but also to provide better support.
And here it is now already partly filled with my brother’s farm equipment! Honestly, I think we would have torn it down if not for my brother farming, we really don’t need that much space. But now that it’s done, I like having the barn full of equipment.
A farmhouse needs a red barn.
In the future, we hope to build a new barn that looks historic, but it will be many years down the road before that happens. Until then we’ll have our not so little lean-to. (We’re planning to paint it next spring.)
In addition to the barn, we had gravel installed. Since we were filling the updated barn, we thought we might as well do the driveway. It needed it, bad.
The sad part of the update was losing the little green grass in the middle of the driveway – so I made sure it showed up again after an afternoon of shoveling it by hand. I like the look of green grass in the middle. I suppose most people might kill it off – but I think there’s something charming about it.
Harvest arrived and with it the last days of warmth. My brother was able to harvest all the soybeans before this wet weather we’ve been having arrived. It’s always a fun time of year that is filled with excitment. I’m again helping where I can hauling in the soybeans into the elevator.
As I write this, we have yet to harvest the field corn because of the weather. After a lot of late nights – we all now wait.
Fall has always been my favorite season. I love the leaves that change and the cooler weather. This year has really given us a nice fall – until it turned frigid this week. Nonetheless, this past week I took a break and sat in the sunshine to read my book to enjoy the changing leaves. Oh, how I love our big front porch.
How has your fall been going?
Yes please to the travel itinerary for your trip as I am a terrible trip planner. Loved reading your last one and have saved the info for when it is safe to travel again.
I’m glad it was helpful. I’m hoping to get the Gettysburg information done sometime within the next few months. 🙂