Sunday, June 7, 2015

The Journey

May 28, 2015
The Journey

All of us are on a journey of some type. I believe the picture I snapped at the left, represents a journey well. The path has a beginning, but we cannot see the end. In fact life throws curves, much like the picture. We don't know where the path will take us, only that we are on it. This blog is about the journey to becoming more self-reliant & using more natural products along with balancing work as a teacher and mom. This was not the path I would have envisioned myself on when I met my husband 13 years ago (WOW, can't believe it has been that long) let alone even 5 years ago. Being a working mom this all sounds like a lofty goal, I mean who has time for this? I would have been skeptical myself a few years ago :) Well, I am here to tell you that, you in fact do. Confucius said, "choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life." All of this that I do on the "side" or even my "real job" as a teacher isn't work, or at least it doesn't feel like it. I enjoy it! I love it! The "work" brings me joy, honest to goodness joy, which seems to be in short supply in our world. The "work" is relaxing, it's not a chore. I'd much rather be doing this "work" any day of the week. Before my journey gets started I need to do introductions.

My husband and I have been married for almost 11 years. We have two boys who will be 4 and 2 in July. We live in the suburbs on 3.5 wooded acres and entertain a host of animals. We have one dog, a whippet named Derby, one outdoor cat named Sinatra (he has blue eyes, so they name fits), a caique named Kai, 7 chickens of varying breeds, and at the moment 5 Nigerian Dwarf goats (2 nannies, Cinnamon and Sugar, and 3 kids(just born this week)). We live in Missouri where my husband and I both grew up. My husband grew up on a farm, I grew up in the city, although I was around farming as my grandparents had a large farm in rural Missouri. Had we asked ourselves when we met or got married what our path would be in a decade, I don't know that this would have quite been it. We wanted kids, that we knew, but the rest of the journey and where we are now, probably not. But, that is the awesome thing about paths, you never know where they lead.