Re-evaluation

Some days I think I have things mostly figured out. There is a general map in my head vaguely outlining the steps and placements of everything that I want to accomplish to build a farm. I get excited, elated. The future seems clean and clear, a chalk drawing on black top, vivid and bright.

I look around and see what could be. A future of farmer's market stands, farm workshops, an animal gallery of friends in the barn that give me food, a garden wonderland teeming with bounty just out my back door. It's a heady thing to grow your own food. To wash the dirt off bright pink new potatoes and think to yourself I made that. There are now two pounds of potatoes that have been consumed that didn't need to be sprayed, dug up with machines, packaged or shipped. Half a meal I didn't have to buy. I get cocky sometimes with the power. I gloat at the grocery store skipping parts of asiles, Ha, ha Smuckers, not today! I make my own jam!

It's not a feeling of superiority, really, it's a feeling of self-reliance. The power feeling comes from my efficientness, my lack of dependency on store bought goods. The deep core knowledge that if some catastrophy came upon us, my kids wouldn't starve because I know how to harvest and put away. I suppose it's a sort of primal triumph.

These good feelings lead me to want to expand the farm; Honey, grain crops, dairy animals, pigs, draft horses, herd dogs, a mini fiber mill, heritage turkey breeding, brick ovens, solar power, milling, the list goes on and on. The chalk drawn map gets larger and larger.

But when does it end? Where do I stop? For now, I'm mostly concerned with providing for my family, selling excess -or trying to, doing things that interest me and that I enjoy. My rental restrictions provide a safety net to not expand too soon but then I get dismayed that the things I want to do I can't. All in good time, I know, but time doesn't last forever.

So, right now on the farm, we're watering and harvesting little bits as the springs plantings finally start producing, we're getting aquainted with the new fowl, watching them grow, we're planning to have our raw wool spun into a marketable, sellable product. I'm re-evaluating what I want to do overall on the farm starting with some personal internal evaluating. Balancing being a homeschool mom raising 5 kids, being in college myself, and persuing other personal interests besides farming is a difficult assignment.