Showing posts with label farm homestead. Show all posts
Showing posts with label farm homestead. Show all posts

Monday, September 12, 2011

Reflections

Yesterday afternoon, my wife and I went over to the old family farm house. It was the first time we were there since it was completely cleaned out after the passing of my dad earlier this spring. It was a time of remembering what was and what will be no more. Below is a poem I wrote expressing some of my continuing emotions from that visit.


Yesterday, a house bustling
A home filled with warmth
Kids filling the air with laughter
Home grown meals full of tantalizing aromas

Today, a house empty, forlorn
Silent, barren, crumbling
A large stump decaying
A time lost forever

A time of grief
Missing what used to be
Knowing what was
Is all but gone

Yet knowing
We who remain
Have what is important
Love that thrives above circumstance

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Farmstead Equipment Auction Circa 1987

These photo's of my dad's farm auction from circa 1987 were almost lost forever. They had been in one of my many boxes of stuff up in the attic of the house for more than a decade. As I was recently cleaning out my stuff these photos got thrown in the dumpster but were discovered by one of my brothers as he was sorting for recyclables. I am grateful he found these. They are not the best quality photos but they are precious memories. As a warning this is a long post!

My dad demonstrating that the tractor starts

Cement mixer and drums with pumps among other things

Farm equipment being auctioned off

Old brooders for chicks

In the front - old chicken feeders from the barn

In the front, chicken crates followed by egg nests and equipment

My dad with the orange hat with two sisters and brother-in-law

Chicken nests in the foreground to the left

In the front - many lawnmowers; to the left - farm equipment

In the front - egg carts used to gather eggs in the chicken house

Refreshment stand in the old corn crib equipment shed

Another view of farm equipment with the honey (manure) wagon in the center

Another auction crowd scene

Small items being auctioned off from tables

Another view with the farm house in the background

Some of the many cars parked in the fields along our driveway

Monday, May 16, 2011

Fond memories of Dad and Mom

It's amazing sometimes what a photo or a few photos can do a person and the memories they trigger both happy and sad. This particular post was inspired by the photo below that my sister gave to me last week.

This photo of myself with my Dad and Mom was taken around three and a half years ago at the wedding reception for my wife and I. Our whole family with all their children was there for our wedding celebration. And my sister came all the way from from Thailand. She is my only sister and I couldn't ask for a better sister than her. We didn't fully know it then but the normality of life as we then knew it was swiftly coming to an end.

At that time we already knew that Mom had Alzheimers and was having some memory problems. But she could still take care of the house, make meals, and have meaningful conversations. And she could still appreciate and enjoy our wedding. But soon after that her abilities rapidly declined. Today she needs total care and she isn't capable of holding a conversation. Yet she is still special; she is my Mom whom I love and who my whole family loves. As for my dad as many of my readers already know, he was diagnosed with cancer a year ago from last fall and passed away the beginning of March this year. But we have many good memories and that is what I want to continue to share in the rest of this post.

Dad always loved dogs. Over the years,
he had a variety of Collies, Beagles, and mixed breeds.

He enjoyed snow and trying out a mini-bike
that one of my brothers bought.

He enjoyed games and celebrations. Here he and Mom are passing
a breath mint from one mouth-held toothpick to the other.

King of the Mountain after coming home from church

Dad enjoyed gardening each summer. Here he is with
some extra tall sunflowers and I think squash.

He enjoyed reading the newspapers to keep up with both local and world news.

Here he and Mom are browsing hymn books
possibly in preparation for singing in a quartet.

And here is Dad on his 65th birthday.

And here is a dogwood in memory of my Dad

Monday, April 25, 2011

More Memories of Dad

Yesterday some digital memorabilia pertaining to Dad was distributed to family members including some older photos. It brought back many good memories. So I thought I would share a small portion of them here.

One of a very few pictures of my Dad as a child

My Dad and Mom were married in 1954 in a double wedding.
Dad and Mom are respectively second and third from the viewer's left.

My Dad and Mom with their first three toddlers

A family picture with all the children; I am the one in the red suit coat.

Here Dad is operating a tractor-powered saw to cut firewood for the wood stove. The chicken house that held 6,000 chickens in cages is in the background. Directly in front of the chicken house was an orchard containing sour cherry, sweet cherry, apple, peach, and apricot fruit trees.

Dad and Mom making apple cider

Dad butchering a chicken while one of us finishes a late supper after work

Dad enjoyed hiking with us kids

Dad reading bedtime stories

Monday, April 4, 2011

Reflections Past and Present

My thoughts have been somewhat in a jumble not totally sure where I want to go with this post. Perhaps it's in part because of a number of events - my dad passing away on March 6, my last uncle on my dad's side passing away on March 27, and several other acquaintances experiencing similar losses in the past month along with important decisions needing to be made yet not hurried. But I'm going to start by sharing an aerial photo of my dad's farm from the early 1960s. It brings back many childhood memories for me.


In this picture to the far left are five chicken coups in a row that were used to house chickens before my time. Next to them are two red buildings side by side. The one closest to the driveway was used to raise chicks for laying hens. I'm not sure what the red building furthermost from the drive was used for. The next red building along the driveway was a combination equipment and corn shed. Then of course comes the large red barn which during my life time was used to house farm equipment, straw, chickens, and sometimes a few other livestock as hobbies by us children. Beyond that was another corn crib and a gray colored chicken house that can't be seen in this picture. The red shed between the barn and the house was mostly a storage shed and at times a garage. It also contained an outhouse where Dad recalls old Sears catalogs were used. As for the farm land Dad grew mostly corn and wheat though he occasionally also farmed oats and barley. Of course, we also had a very large farm patch in which we grew most of the vegetables we ate. Dad also grew lots of fruit trees and harvested some raspberries and blackberries that grew wild in hedge rows and woods.


A beautiful sign of Spring
Bright spots in the midst of lostness



Lastly, but not least, I want to highlight a book that I just recently read. Especially in light of the experiences I and my family have had recently, it is an encouragement to push on and to remember that we'll all be reunited again some day in the future. As I'm writing this I'm thinking of the song "I'm so glad I'm a part of the family of God." So while I'm experience some feelings of lostness right now, I'm ultimately a part of a much larger family that I'll experience in  a much greater way when I get to Heaven. And that larger family will include my more immediate family that I'm missing now.


And if you have 15 minutes this is worth watching.
Eric Whitacre is a talented composer and director.

Monday, March 14, 2011

On The Homestead

Today, I spent a few hours on the Rice Homestead taking some of my last photos from there. Mom has now moved to the home of one of my brothers. In time the property will be put up for sale though one of my siblings lives there for the time being. It struck me as I reminisced through the property how that so much had changed already through the years since I've been a child. Below are a few photos from my time there today.

 

This picture was taken from my childhood church home looking across the cemetery. The cemetery is much larger than it appears here. The house I lived in as a child and into my adulthood for some years is located on the far left. Behind the house is our red barn which for many years housed a couple thousand chickens, loads of straw bales, and farm machinery. There was also a chicken house that held six thousand chickens to the left of the house but not seen in this photo. On the right are some of my brothers' greenhouses. And in the back of the photo is a neighboring dairy farm.


Here's a view of the house with part of the barn in the background. Over the years, we spent a lot of time on the porch of this house. I remember in particular watching thunderstorms from there and helping Mom and Dad prepare fruits and vegetables for canning and freezing.


Here's the dinner bell that was used precisely for that purpose or anytime we were too far away to be called by the voice. As children we roamed a wide stretch of the farm and the bell was the easiest way to call us in.


Here's another view of the barn in the center with a corn crib and machinery shed on the left and the larger chicken house on the right. The barn actually used to be longer than it is in this picture.


This photo is a part of the main barn door taken from inside the barn. I took this photo because I like the wood grain and colors. In a future post, I may display more interior photos from the barn.


Here's a photo of a clock my dad gave to my Mom many years ago. The wood grain shown here is the same as the rest of the kitchen cupboards. Mom and us children spent a lot of time in this kitchen. She made sure we all at least knew the basic rudiments of cooking and baking.


This is some of the decor from the living room. Mom decorated her home with many knickknacks and pictures throughout the home. She knew how to make a house a home.