We were welcomed into the home of a beautiful family yesterday evening for supper and company.  Another family is there camping out and between the two families there were nine little blondes running around between the ages of nine months and eight years.  The scene looked all the world like the movie “Yours, Mine and Ours” and the chaos was more intoxicating than the chilled glasses of Chardonnay.

Christy and Kevin live on thirty-five acres in Elizabeth.  A place that Christy could only dream of.  She had hoped to find a place with four stalls and instead found a place with a riding arena and eight stalls!

Their list of critters includes turkeys, geese, ducks, chickens, sheep, goats, barn cats, Colorado Mountain dogs, and pigs.  I was surprised to see my friend, Faleena’s horse there too!

The homestead was bustling, the women working with kabobs and babies in the kitchen and the men working to complete chores.  Doug and I jumped into our expected roles, he out in the barn with the men and I set a baby on my hip.  I do love the busyness of a kitchen and a large family.  I do find myself missing the days when my children were little and the house was wild with local kids and pets all waiting for dinner.

We cooed over the baby Nubians and pet the friendly dogs and enjoyed the setting sun across the prairie as a hawk soared overhead.

We realized that even though we are thrilled being around the type of homestead we always worked for and that type of work is genuine and fine, we are not looking for anything of that scale any longer.

After we found out we were being forced off our farm we stopped.  Just stopped.  All of a sudden there was no more wood to chop, no more goats to milk, no more chickens to tend to, no more gardens to water, no more life.  We felt ourselves fall into a deep fatigue.  I am not sure how many years we would have been able to keep that kind of activity up as there are just two of us and the type of homestead we wanted really requires a family.  We are glad we experienced that lifestyle.  Moving forward it will be nice to rebuild and only allow in our very favorite parts of the life we loved.  I cannot imagine not having a garden.  I can do without the fiber arts.  I love cooking but I only want to preserve what I really enjoy, not thirty-seven quarts of carrots just to get through the winter.  We can enjoy a few chickens maybe but not the exorbitant feed bill that we had every month.

With that we will only buy things that we need.  Things that make our home home to us.  Bunk beds for visiting grandbabies.  A bed for guests.  An art room.  An office.  A large kitchen.  We know what we want because we have lived without and can decipher what really makes our life great to us.  The large bustling homestead was awesome.  Our last few homesteads were fun.  I suppose I won’t be considered a homesteader anymore.  More like a 1950’s housewife but that is okay with me.  I found it ironic that just when we thought we were nearly self reliant, we found ourselves 100% in need.  It will be fun reworking the next half of our life to include all the things we really, really love and schedule in rest and fun as well!