“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”

—Eleanor Roosevelt.

I was sitting in the garden one afternoon, digging potatoes after pruning and tying up the wild tomatoes that had toppled over. Covered in dirt, hot and sweaty and still in love with life, I could hear the roosters that we didn’t want trying to perfect their crows and in doing so, breaking out into “crowing wars.” I could see the goats running as our younger kids were playing with them and our oldest daughter sat in the pasture watching them play. The chickens were doing what chickens do…pecking the ground, running around like tiny fluffy butt velociraptors, gobbling up the grub worms I had dug up and thrown to them. My husband was busy building a stand for our new venture…worm composting. He says to me “there’s a surprise for you in the barn!” I jokingly guess is it another chicken?! Turns out it was a metal rooster with a basket to hold my most loved garden tools. I smiled and thanked him before putting some of my hand tools in the basket, then scanned the garden for the perfect spot to hang another piece of art, a wooden sign that I painted pink with flowers, bees, sunshine and lady bugs “Avery’s Garden” and I anticipated the coming seasons with our first grand baby running around. She’ll love picking the cherry tomatoes and eating them straight from the vines!

When we first moved into our home in 2020, we had big dreams and plans to start building our homestead. We would walk the property each night and dream out loud, pointing out the best places for goats, where to put the chicken coop and how many raised garden beds we would have. These dreams were transferred from our minds and onto paper, because a dream written down becomes a goal. A goal broken down into steps becomes a plan and a plan backed by action becomes reality. In two years, we have built a glorious garden space, transformed an old crooked barn into a chicken coop, built fences and pastures for our goats and started preserving food to fill the larder shelves, all while learning as we grow.

There are so many moments on the homestead when I just stop and look around, taking in the sights and sounds of the beauty surrounding us. There was a time when we would travel to different hiking trails and parks, near and far, and take beautiful pictures of wildlife and wildflowers. That was just a few years ago. Now, we can walk our own trails through our own fields and experience that same beauty, and my camera roll is filled with 18,000 pictures of our homestead. There was a time when I dreamed of having chickens and goats and now they are a reality, and quickly became the joy of my heart.

For quite some time, I had this feeling of longing for something more. More gardens, more time, more animals, more time still, more of something that I couldn’t quite figure out. It pulled on my heart for so long that I just started praying for God to lead me to whatever it was that I was longing for, show me the way to get there and guide me in the process. As I sat elbows deep in dirt digging those potatoes I realized He had already given us infinitely more than I could have ever dreamed of or asked for, it was already in my hands. The dirt, the roosters we never wanted, the goofy looking hens, the baby goats, the joy in our children’s eyes, the 12ft tall sunflower, foggy sunrises and “the sky is lava” sunsets. Keep dreaming.