Our journey to a sustainable, comfortable homestead will be documented here. This is a tiny preview of what we hope will be a giant adventure for our marriage, our eventual family, and the community we are a part of. <3 Cheers to new beginnings and chasing dreams!
A Time of Uncertainty – Summer 2019
Role reversal! I quit my job as an environmental specialist with a large infrastructure company and my husband earned his Doctorate of Physical Therapy Degree! We moved four and half hours north to the rural hospital he now works from and began searching for a home! I continued my environmental work with Ecosystems, llc and became easily distracted with the mundane paperwork and ‘life’ stuff. This was a period of waiting, wondering, and frustration for us as we tried to settle in to our new life. Hard to do without a place to call home… check out Purchasing Our First Homestead for more details on this! Read on for spoilers. (:
Seasons of Change – Fall 2019
SURPRISE! WE’RE PREGNANT! While not a surprise for us, we felt so relieved and excited that God blessed our growing family. This will be our first little one! Through a tornado of daydreams, reality started to fall into place. Busy professionally and coaching cross country, autumn rolled in and with it we began to finalize a deal on a twenty-one acre farmstead not far from family and work. On November first, we moved into our first home and immediately dove into a season of projects and planning. Overwhelmed and emotional, creativity took a backseat and some panic and seasonal depression set in. Drifted Way really took a backseat during this turbulent time in our lives. The future is for growth, and I am praying that in the future there is not another season so devoid of my passions. Hopefully, there is not another season of overlapping pregnancy exhaustion and home owner to-do lists! We live and we learn.
As the Wind Blows – Winter 2020
What even just happened? We are not so sure ourselves! We had too many memorable moments from our first winter on the Homestead. Enjoy laughing at the following, not forgetting that one of us is pregnant and neither of us have any experience living in the country in a 1900’s farmhouse.
- We ran out of propane like true first-timers on a cold winter’s night. Thankfully, the home has a wood burning furnace in the basement and some dry wood in the pole shed. After many phone calls and a nervous light of a match, we had heat that night and a propane refill on the way. I was sure to ask a ton of questions- this will not happen again!
- Winter strikes hard and fast up north- a big dump of two plus feet of snow had us buried way before we were prepared. My father’s hand-me-down push blower and a couple of shovels got us down our very long driveway early the next morning. We did not learn from this, and found ourselves pushing snow like idiots for most of the winter. A tractor will be one of our first spring purchases!
- Our water just… stopped… one day. With the ground still snow covered, I was so proud of my husband for diagnosing the problem on his own! We were trying to save money everywhere we could and find some confidence through our mistakes. IT WAS THE PRESSURE TANK. Who knew?
- We fostered a dog from the local shelter. We have hemmed and hawed about having a dog on the farm for protection and for company. Unfortunately, ‘Jax’ was not the right fit and managed to escape our grasp twice. The shelter said he was a runner, and they were not kidding! Feeling like pet failures, he was usually found a few miles down the road and eventually with a neighbor’s dead chicken in his mouth. He was adopted by a family in the city with a fence- a much better fit!
Winters are hard for me personally and I am excited to leave this specific winter behind for better days ahead. Baby is growing bigger and bigger and we are (slowly) learning how to manage this house and the land in a way that will work for us.