Moving Back to the Farm
Happy November to you, dear reader. I must admit, I had good intentions about creating and sharing this autumn, but life decided to throw another curveball my way (a few actually, but I will have to share the others later). Back in the summer, you may remember that Kyle and I started a little food business called The Prairie Kitchen. Initially, we were wanting to find and operate a full kitchen food truck. As you may imagine, that did not exactly happen.
This was not due to financial woes, rather we had a few trucks that we liked and were even making plans to travel and view for ourselves, but some offers fell through, we didn’t like the financing options, and some just plain didn’t work out. We were bummed and wondering what to do next when my parents sat us down and said, “Would you ever consider moving back to the farm?” We were not expecting that at all!
There we were, sitting at the dining table in our home we had only bought one year ago, contemplating whether or not we should leave it behind. It was an overwhelming decision, but it also was one of the easiest decisions we have had to make in our marriage. In the course of two years living off of the farm, we had managed to collect dozens of things, create our own routine, have another baby, acquire two new vehicles, and create jobs. There was a lot we would have to “give up” to move again. Would that be worth it?
When Kyle and I first were engaged, he was living in an apartment a little over a half hour away from the farm. I can remember asking him the same question then, “Would you ever consider moving to the farm?” and I can remember the silent hesitation hanging in the room while I waited for his answer. We were trying to think of ways we could save money for our wedding and future home, as neither of us had steady paychecks. It was a simple solution that he did say yes to and we lived for about two years as one big family, and it was some of the best times we had on the farm, all working together and sharing meals and evenings.
As we sat again, in the resounding silence of a new adventure, it was almost immediately that we both turned to each other and said, “I think it could work.”
It all came down to the words we had been living by for almost a decade: slow and simple. After moving back into town, it was only a couple of months into purchasing our home did the fairy dust and romance of the place begin to become washed from our eyes. The yard proved to be inadequate for growing a vegetable garden with almost full shade in each part of the landscape. The luster of convenience of nearby schools, parks, and shops became an excuse to stay home and try to recapture the feelings of freedom and escape that comes with country living. The near constant intrusion of neighbors became overwhelming, and I found myself staying inside of the house most days when I longed to be wandering about chasing chickens and sweating in the garden. I had only lived in the country for a few years, my husband the same, and it took moving back to town for us to realize how absolutely joyous isolation could be. I’ve never felt more able to be myself than on the farm, where I can wear what I like and do my work without the eyes of others upon me, where our neighbors have become family as there is no close family around, where people still say hello and offer their help when harvest comes around and bring casseroles to your door when you welcome a new baby or someone is sick, and where we can spend more time together working to make our land a more beautiful spot to leave behind.
Of course, those were all fairly selfish reasons. They were things that I knew came from a place of privilege. We were giving up a perfectly good home simply because it did not suit our family any longer. But there were other reasons, too. One being that we plan to open a small cafe and bakery on the farm sometime next year, rather than have a food truck. Living on the property will make life much simpler for everyone involved as we work towards a common goal and eventually spend early mornings and late evenings baking and preparing meals. Two being that the children were not benefiting from town life at all. The new school we had started was not a good fit, playing outdoors was more complicated with many strangers walking past and traffic, and there was a connection to the earth that was deeply missing. Three being the ideal lifestyle of a multi-generational home. This is something that I could write endlessly about, but I will leave it at this: everything becomes simplified. Payments, vehicles, groceries and meals, childcare, workload, house cleaning, downsizing, quality time. It is all better, and we are so so happy that we were welcomed back.
Here we are, back at the farm. We spent the past few weeks moving our belongings for a third time, for what I hope is the last time. I have moved nine times in the past eight years. I am tired of moving. Tad has moved five or six of those times. Each time, as I have spoken on this blog before, I release more and more material things. When we moved to the little farm cottage when we were first married, after several years of living a minimalist lifestyle, I will admit that I went into a bit of a shopping craze because I had never had my own home before. I was so excited to be able to thrift for the things that before I felt I could not have, things like candle sconces and primitive kitchen bowls and little cabinets and baskets galore.
Now that mom and I are living together again, we’ve made an effort to combine our styles, hers being more modern farmhouse and mine being more minimalistic primitive. It had made a pretty nice marriage, I think. I am excited to share more of the home, which feels much cozier now that we’ve combined our furniture.
In all, it feels so nice to be back. I am looking forward to a winter of crafting and preparing our home for the holidays. I hope, too, now that we are back that means I can begin to share more again here as I have help with the small people who take up a lot of my time, though I would not ask for anything else!
xoxo Kayla
