the importance of goals, and an apology

If anyone is still here reading this, I'd like to apologize for being gone for so long. Late summer and early fall are always busy times around here, and I've also spent much time considering the purpose of this blog. I regret to say that for now, the proposed new website is off the table. After a great deal of soul searching, I had to admit that I'm actually a farmer by nature, and that what I need is less screen time, not more. This blog will continue on as it has. I'll keep sharing stories of our crazy, dirty, difficult and utterly satisfying life if you, dear readers, wish to keep reading them.

Now, since you're not here for my blathering, let's get to the meat and potatoes...

Early December here means the final stages of winter wrap-up. This is the time when we put the farm to bed and actually put our feet up for a short while (a very short while - we start the spring garden in early February). The goats are bred and we're done milking until they kid in the spring. The freezer is full of broiler chickens, milk and cheese. The larder is full of preserves, soups, spaghetti sauce, fruit, veggies, and dried herbs. We're stocked up on hay and firewood and there's nothing left to do in the garden. We are now in bare-bones maintenance mode. Until the first seed catalog arrives, we'll kick back, visit with friends, enjoy the holidays, and work on projects we can't seem to find time for during the rest of the year.

Each New Year's Day, we set goals for ourselves - we decide what we want to accomplish in the coming year, where we want to see ourselves. It is around this time that I like to revisit them to see how we've done. I'm bursting with pride to say that out of fifteen goals - some small, but many rather ambitious - we can check off eleven of them! This is tremendous, yet doesn't take into account all the everyday work we do, plus some things we undertook that weren't even on the list. I couldn't be more proud of our efforts. We've all heard that if you want to get somewhere, you must first know where you're going, and that couldn't be more true. Now we'd best enjoy our bit of respite, because it's almost time to make a new list.