Mommin' Through Life

W ill Rogers once said, "The farmer has to be an optimist or he wouldn’t still be a farmer." As I read that quote the other day, I thought about how true that was. Just in the past week there has been a farmer who lost his combine to a fire and a farmer whose barn went up in flames. I also read about a community that stepped up to help harvest crops that belonged to a farmer with cancer. Talk about having some optimism despite tragedy and loss! I’ve discussed my childhood before and growing up on a dairy farm. However, pondering what Will Rogers said brought back a lot of memories from when I grew up; some good memories and some bad, some happy and sad. One memory I won’t ever forget is when I was awaken one night by hearing a cow heavily breathing right outside my window. Well, for those who have raised animals, we all know what it means when they are breathing heavy ... they probably have been running. Upon going outside, my siblings, parents and I didn’t find ...

A few weeks ago my husband came in from mowing our yard and said, "Remember those rotten pumpkins from last fall that I tossed across the road by the mailbox?" I replied with one of those "trying-to-remember" looks on my face that every wife knows, "Uh, sure." With excitement he said, "Well, guess what. They grew some pumpkins!" As the season of thankfulness approaches us within the next month leading up to Thanksgiving, the story of our volunteer pumpkins is more than just a story, but a blessing. It’s not always the big things in life that bring us the most joy, but the little things sometimes give us the greatest reward. Our 5- and 3-year-old boys sure were excited to be able to walk with us across the road to pick a couple of pumpkins that night. They even helped me decorate our home with them! Life brings us so many obstacles and trials that I often think we forget to look at the little things as blessings just as much as the b...