Happy New Year!

Our New Year is off to a lovely and productive start and I hope yours is too!

I’m not a huge one for making resolutions, but when I do they’re usually along the lines of “I’m not going to suck at growing tomatoes this year”.

This year I’m not so much making a resolution as an effort to tighten my focus on making the most of what we have. Let me expand on that.

I’ve always had the dream of starting from scratch on bare land and really “pioneering it up”.  I saw us making our own food, digging our own well, and generally being self-reliant. (Although not totally self-sufficient. In my daydream I walk into town to trade my fresh bread and eggs for the things we can’t produce, you know, just like Ma. Even though I have a car. Ahem.)

For a while I’ve let that dream cause me to feel discontent with our real life.  But a few weeks ago I sort of woke up and realized that many of the conveniences I’ve been feeling like a fraud for using are actually things that the pioneers worked pretty hard to put in place on their bare lands.

We’re talking about stuff like running water here. Most of the world considers it an asset and I’ve been over here wishing I was dipping my water from a icy-cold stream. How ridiculous is that?

So this year I’m trying to see our half acre through the eyes I had when we were home-shopping and it jumped off the page as the perfect place for us. I’m going to focus more on blending that pioneer daydream with real life, and being thankful for the parts that don’t have to be a struggle. Just run a hot bath and sink in?  Yes. Yes, please.

So I have a washing machine. That means I can spend my time weeding the garden, or heck, reading a book.  I don’t have to scrub the undies by hand.

Hooray!

Yes, I have running water. Good. As it turns out developing a water source is kind of a big task, and I’m thankful someone did it before we got here!

So we only have half an acre. Awesome! I can be to the chicken coop and back in about a minute and a half.

Our life is so stinkin’ good!

So instead of not growing a really productive medium sized garden because if it’s not an acre it feels like it doesn’t count, I’m going to focus on making our garden a living classroom for learning and teaching the kids what works here, where we are, in the life we actually have, and enjoying the fruits of our work as they come.

With seed catalogs starting to roll in I really have the gardening bug right now. It’s genuinely too early to start planting (except maybe some greens and herbs in my window!!) and I don’t have my seeds yet. But it’s been a mild winter so far, so I got the greenhouse set up.   I put in a 2 x 5 foot compost bin, which will hopefully heat up in time to give my early seedlings a cozy start in February or March.

I’m very excited about finding ways to blend our modern life with my pioneer daydream.  Maybe some day we’ll outgrow this place and move a little further out where we’ll have to rough it a bit more.  Maybe not.  For now we’re going to grow where we’re planted.

What have you got up your sleeve this New Year?