As I sit here thinking about the new year and all of the new plans and possibilities I have for it, I can’t help but to be thankful for everything that 2019 brought us. It was this same time last year that I started to commit a little more to doing a blog (something I’ve wanted to do for so so long). I was doing some research, watching YouTube videos, getting a website set up, and thinking of all the adventures I’d write about! Then, before I had a chance to get my blog really up and going, life started to get crazy! Suddenly all of the things I wanted to blog about were going on around me and there was no time to put it all into words!
Here’s a bit of my year in review:
We decided to purposely get a couple of bottle calves to raise (unlike that orphan calf that was graciously given to us by a neighbor last year in the hopes that we could keep it alive). The excitement of little calves running free, bucking, and frolicking is one of my favorite things to watch. I am thankful that we will soon refill our freezer with beef that we have raised ourselves from day three!
A very very wet spring led to a delay in garden planting…
I learned that I’m not exactly great at starting plants from seeds. It’ll take a little more research and planning on my part before I tackle that again. In the meantime I’ll buy plants already started- much less stressful for me! I can feel the frustration again just thinking about last year’s garden beginnings, but I am thankful that most of my plants were able to produce enough for us to eat fresh and preserve for later.
Speaking of gardens, I love to can things! The tops of my kitchen cabinets are filled with stewed tomatoes, relishes, jellies, and even pumpkin. I have ground beef, chicken, and stew meat ready for quick meals. I gave homemade jelly and relish for Christmas gifts. I even have SEMO District Fair blue ribbon winning corn up there! I am thankful every time I look up there and it reminds me of the warmer months of summer. I am thankful for my canning friend Heather who is just as excited about canning stuff as I am! This year we plan on coming home with even more blue ribbons! 
Baby chicks arrived in May. This was the first time that we’d ever ordered chicks from a hatchery. With the help of my friend Suzanne at Outlaw Farms, we purchased our first French Black-Copper Marans. Baby chicks of course led to the construction of a new chick coop, then prettier nesting boxes and roosting space, and eventually a whole screened in outside enclosure for when it would be deemed necessary to keep the chickens from roaming as widely as usual.
I am thankful for a husband who is not only handy with tools but also willing to build what I think we need and with much better results than I envision.
September brought together some of my “obsessions”. A summer full of canning veggies, meat, and jams was wrapped up with our local district fair. My canned goods brought home two blue ribbons and a red. Our first chicken show resulted in a very proud eight-year old when he saw the blue ribbon hanging on the cage of his cockerel.
As a child, I loved walking through the Arena building looking at all of the homemade quilts, strolling through the tents full of livestock, and of course checking out the 4-H projects to see how many ribbons I had scored. I am thankful that I was able to share some of that excitement with my friends and family.
Everything else seems to have gotten lost amongst the chaos of our every day lives- starting third grade, charity work, Bloody Mary Sundays, long talks on the porch, new cookbooks…and I am thankful for all of it! Bring on 2020!
I love you and ranch.