Cutting time.....on the ground she goes.

August brings tobacco harvest....and normally some of the hottest weather of summer! Each plant has to be manually cut with a hatchet and laid down with ease so the leaves do not break. The slump is about all you see of our guys when cutting. You stay bent over at the waist so that you can slightly bend each plant over to cut it at it's base.

Once cut the sticks are then dropped at the groupings of plants in order to start spiking. The sun and heat wilts the plants so the plant becomes in "order" or a limp state to ensure proper readiness for spiking.

During hot weather you have to constantly watch the tobacco from sun burning. Just like you or I would burn, the leaves can burn and injure the tobacco.  

 

Not your ordinary field of wagons....

To some this May seem like a field of tobacco wagons....and yes they are....but to us it is a field of dreams.

Each wagon is pulled back and forth during harvest season to the field....to the barn and vice versa numerous times.  As they do serve a purpose....to transport our tobacco crop.....they also serve an even greater purpose....and that's a memory!!!!

Each hand that touches each wagon has a story....some It's a story of survival...others it's food on the table.

For my family, it's living the dream of working on one of Gods greatest masterpieces....this earth.  One wagon may represent being able to pay for electricity, another wagon represents being able to put food on my plate, another.... knowing that I'm able to feed 12 families beyond myself that live on this farm.  The list could go on every time I look at each wagon, because it is hours spent away from family, it is sweat shed from exhaustion, it's a playground for my children when they have to come to the field.  

And the end of each harvest they all come back empty to be put back in the barn for another year.

Farming as I have found isn't just a lifestyle....it's where you grow up....it's where you look back at how far you have come as a worker....as a family....and where you created your life!! 

My friends...our workers...our family gets bigger this time of the year!

Each year it feels like Christmas eve at this time...... We wait and wait then finally have to head to bed and find out the boys have arrived overnight. Today is like Christmas morning all over again for my girls. I actually heard them stir before their alarm clock even went off and when it did I called their names to come downstairs..... There they were dressed and ready to head out the door before 7 AM. Yes, all this to see their friends that have arrived back to live on the farm and work!

We hear many comments from those in the community the nation and even friends on "how we could hire labor outside of the US when there are so many American citizens that need jobs." And to be honest, really honest........ The simple answer no one here wants to work. But that could definitely start a whole new rant of how I feel about the issue and those that do not understand.

This will be our 9th season to have our friends come in. And most and then have been here as the original crew. For my Sayde was born the December before our two workers Oscar and Leonel arrived in May. Both of them being babies know no difference between us and them.  We all celebrate together, laugh together, and even cried together when we need to. In nine years time we have grown lots of crops, families and the farm all together!  

The Mexies as we call our boys live on the farm next to the house......another reason we are so close as a family!

I personally cannot imagine not having them in our lives especially with all the work that they have committed to us over the years.  We work as a team, we live as a team. For those of you that don't understand and want to judge first, please I welcome you out to the farm to come experience our life and then maybe you can decide. Their money is put back into our community for food and well-being. 

Girls welcoming back our family to the farm!!! 

Each one of them has a family, has a life, and a job back in their country. Most of them have babies while they are here and do not get to welcome their new son or daughter into their life until they are sometimes months old. Imagine yourself leaving thousands and thousands of miles between you and your family......to provide a better life for the ones your love. It is a pretty selfless way of living....... 

A farmer having daughters.....never did I know that I would have 12 sons one day!

Hands in the dirt......hearts at work

Back bends...bridges....and farm moms

One of my most favorable times of the year is when is comes time for field work ......but I become single mommy to 2 girls.  The farmer comes in after the girls go to bed and leaves before our 6:30 am alarm goes off.  And each morning like clock work one of the girls asks like a broken record.."where is daddy".  

So like every farmers wife I get 'em up, get 'em out, check on the farmer, try to get some house work done along with lunch and supper then head back to school......to round em up again.

Getting to see him smile from the back of his head is all worth my long days sometimes.....and when it all works right it's worth that even more!

From running kids to after school activities to coaching soccer and track meets the farm mom tackles house/farm chores and still finds time to cook and prepare the day again for tomorrow.  

It's just not the girls at gymnastics whose abilities can extend to back bends and bridges.....it's the mommies that bend and bridge the farm family together so it all flows! Or it's another day in the life of the farmers wife.....

March Madness

Love how March turns the lights on around here! Not just longer daylight but the electric seems to go up because the shop work increases ten fold.  The tractors are making their way out of the barns and sheds....the planter is dug out to begin it's final preparations for April planting....and the roads seem more traveled with equipment.  The air has become a hair warmer after this harsh cold winter and the wind always seem to be blowing.  The farmer gets up early and stays in the shop til this momma calls him home to eat. Harder on the girls and I because dinner is moved back about an hour due to the longer daylight. 

We all start to get a little quirky because we know Dad will soon be gone long hours.....and sometimes not come home til after the girls go to bed.  

The smell of grease and oil fills the shop...AND MY LAUNDRY ROOM! Our winter hibernation comes to an abrupt end 😞.

But we love routines around here! Not a schedule but the routines of getting work complete. Unlike many we aren't bound by time schedules....we can plan all winter long but until the weather is set we work til the job is done. 

The girls look forward to March madness because they know

•time outside is longer 

•tractor rides become the way of travel to spend time with their parents

•they can watch tv in the office because dad is working in the shop

•more picnic dinners

•and their most favorite.....their boys are due within weeks to the farm!

Welcome spring.....we are sooooo ready for you!

Farm And Fitness

As a farm mom we are like every other mom in the world. We get up start our day with the kids getting them to school and then head to our second job either on the farm or working with the public.  We end our day trying to be mom/wife /farmer and then lay our heads down in exhaustion!  So who has time to exercise and be healthy right?

WRONG!!  

As the most important part of our day is others....why isn't it OURSELVES? I have learned thru my love hate relationship of running the amazing feeling I get when I accomplish something for myself. It's the rise of mental attitude and knowing if momma feels good then my afternoon and night will be better. 

I am like every mother in the sense that I feel guilty when I take time for myself. Or I feel guilty when people constantly say "who has time to workout" or "I work and have to run kids." Well so do I and most everyone else!! I can't worry about your life but only my own. To live a healthy lifestyle it must start with yourself. It takes time to buy and grow the proper foods that I know will be healthy and substainable for my family. Prioritizing what's important for you and not someone else should be your first goal!

Forget those that are jealous you MAKE time to exercise....

A farmer gets the hype that we aren't human. We are regulated in our jobs like you are in yours....I wouldn't feed my kids anything that you wouldn't feed yours. The difference in me is that I research and trust my fellow farmers in food growth. I rock the beat to my own drum. I have learned that properly taking care of my family first comes with me....I am glad you don't have time to workout.  That means there is less at the gym when I go.  

Never feel discouraged or complain there isn't time....if there is a will there is a way!

Why do I FARM?  Because I can Find A Reasonable Mean in anything! Now get out and get busy....

If you GROW it then you will KNOW it

12 years ago we bought our first cattle crop......unknowingly understanding the importance at the time of what "raising your own beef" meant.  As a business venture and our love for animals we spent the first year grooming and raising a breed of animals like no other.  

A city girl myself we always had a freezer full of farm raised beef.  We bought a half of a cow yearly when we could afford it because we knew how it was raised and the quality it would attest too!

Scott and I married young and were green so it was much easier to sell calves and make back our initial Investment money than to hold one back for your own freezer.  

The beef lovers that we are took the opportunity over the last few years to cull and groom some stock of our own for our table. Why??  Because each calf we raise is fed with quality hay and all natural feed. I don't just have the title of farmer but as mother too. I know exactly what goes in and out of each cow and what to expect when my husband brings the beef home.

My advice....don't gripe about your local stores and gossip over the latest news on meat. The medias job is to publicize news true or not for a thrill and a public rise. Find a local trusted farmer who KNOWS what they GROW! Or GROW It YOURSELF! To many use their mouth to try to solve an issue finding that they have only paralyzed their hands at fixing it.....time wasted and energy. 

Along with our farm raised beef we raise home grown veggies (salsa too) and chickens for organic style eggs!