What a great story! I love the “city girl marries the farmer’s son”! And what a wonderful life you’ve had with him. I’m a city girl but spent every summer living on my grandma’s farm. It taught me to value the land and the world around me…made me more connected. It’s obviously worked the same charm on you.

You’ve also worked ‘your dang fool head off’ (haha, my grandmother)! All those years of raising sheep, the cattle and your impressive shelves of preserves! That’s a lost art, isn’t it? My mom used to feed us all winter on her jars of goodies from the basement, along with crocks of kraut, carrots, etc. Oh your poor garden with the cattle eating 142 sets of onion tops! Glad they weren’t milk cows, or were they? 😂

It had to be a very melancholy time for you when you sold your flock of sheep. That was a long time to dedicate so much time, energy, worry and love. You’re a really great mom to have kept that 4H & FFA project going for so many years. I’m guessing many, many years after your daughter or daughters were out of the house! LOL. (I know the feeling on a smaller scale with pets that couldn’t trail after her to college.)

One of my close friends for the past 40+ years had to sell his milk herd a couple of years ago because of a health issue. He was crushed, and didn’t really want to do it, but they went to a good friend of his. In retrospect he feels it was the best thing that happened and he should have done it a long time ago. Now he grows thousand of pumpkins, squash and ornamental corn besides the best sweet corn I’ve ever had and he’s having a blast. So I can imagine it’s with a sense of relief you don’t have the worry of winter lambing and keeping them warm and healthy.
You still have a healthy dose of country living with your daily chores, gardening and cows. Thank you for the dedication, I know farming isn’t an easy job but a labor of love.

Here’s a couple of pictures of my friend, Farmer Joe’s pumpkins.