Every farm is different, but here is a break down of what our farm in Northeast Kansas looks like.
Briefly, let’s do a whole farm overview. In the coming weeks we will break each segment of the operation down in more detail, but let’s start with a whole broad sweep.
My Forever and I both grew up on very similar farming operations. After getting married, I moved into his operation. It is a family operation with three generations involved. There are three of us full time on the farm, My Forever, myself and my father-in-law, Henry. My mother-in-law takes care of all the paperwork for the farm and keeps us well fed. She also helps in the evenings and weekends when she can. Matt’s grandparents started the operation. His grandpa had a four wheeler wreck and passed away before I came into the picture. His grandma remains a large land owner in the operation.
We have cow/calf pairs, row crops (corn and soybeans, rotated and mixed with cover crops), hay and pasture ground. Each operation will be broken down into much more detail in future blogs! Matt and I have chickens, but they aren’t involved in the family farm. They are a hobby for me basically!
Matt loves working in the shop on projects. He’s an amazing creator. He can fix anything that is broken. He can create, out of nothing, almost anything. He loves making and fixing things! We save quite a bit of money on repairs because he can fix a lot of things! He’s so talented in everything he does.
Here’s the thing…life on the farm is incredibly hard. There are a lot of dynamics involved in a multi-generational business. Working with family everyday is hard. Working with your spouse and then letting things go at night, is difficult. The days are long. The work is hard. The stress is high. There is always something to be done-we are never “caught up”. Matt does something on the farm everyday, weekends don’t mean two days off. He is always doing something. Since we don’t have kids, I work a lot of hours alongside of him. Because of this, we both pitch in with the house and keeping up with laundry and dishes and cleaning. But honestly, in the busy seasons, a lot of the housework gets skipped over. There are so many hours in the day and we have to take something off our plate.
Farming is a lifestyle that not very many people want. We have a multigenerational family business. Our business has to make money, otherwise three families are out an income. We put so much of our blood, sweat and tears into making this operation profitable so that we can continue the life that Matt has dreamed about living since he was a little boy. We are living our dreams. It’s hard, it’s draining, it’s exhausting, but it’s our dream and we love it!