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Living on a farm like ours is not the same as living on a real farm. We don’t raise and sell produce, meat, or other animal products.

To live here, one needs to:

Love nature and want to live in it. To walk in the woods and see stars in the sky.

Love animals without planning to sell them or send them to slaughter.

Accept the weather, hot and cold.

Be willing to pay for feeding, hay, and water flow.

To accept endless chores and challenges from broken fences to fallen tree limbs to rats and mice to roofs and fences.

Every morning in our lives begins with manure – moving it and spreading it.

Maintain old houses that need constant room and septic maintenance.

To care for gardens that grow food as well as beauty.

To not have much money. What you have goes to the farm.

To drive for almost every need, sometimes as far as 30 miles.

To use wood stoves if possible and buy wood and clean bricks.

To hire help if you want to go away; the animals can’t be left alone.

To pay veterinary bills.

To learn that money is important, but not everything.

To live in community, where neighbors matter.

To shock family members who live in cities.

To find silence when we need it.

To be happy and fortunate in living in such beauty and integrity.

To love our way of life.

To be tired every night of life.

I’ve lived the urban life, and now, the rural life, and I wouldn’t go back for anything.

It’s not for everyone, but it is for us.

This is how we wish to live; we accept its challenges and costs and appreciate its beauty and quiet.