I always knew I was destined for farm life.....

Growing up as a child in Canada's largest city, Toronto, I always new I was meant to be living somewhere else....From going to my grandparent's hobby farm of ten acres since I was a squirt, and going there on the weekends and some holidays, I always just knew I was meant for so much more than living in the city...those fun times as a kid, and playing with my older sister, and aunty (who was a year older than me), having the time of our lives, playing in the fields of wild flowers, playing in an old shack in the forest, and playing at the pond, and helping with the family garden, growing vegetables, and getting into mischief like finding rotten eggs on the manure pile that came from a neighbouring farmer, and stepping on them and running for the hills because they stunk so bad and killing ourselves laughing, and just feeling carefree, happy, and full of life...it's endless the times we had there, endless...anyways, besides getting a taste of my grandparents hobby farm, I also got to get my hands dirty in our small backyards in the city, ever so proud to help out my parents with the small vegetable garden, and plantings of fruit trees, and perennials and flowering shrubs....The chance at around the age of ten, to travel with my own parents to the shores of Lake Huron, and take in some of the towns along the lake (like Kincardine, Goderich, Port Elgin, Southhampton), going to the beautiful beaches and camping, renting cottages etc...also taking in the Bruce Peninsula, and Manitoulin Island, and other parts of Georgian Bay....all good memories, and times I would never have had, if it wasn't for my mom pushing my dad to get us there! Little did I ever know then that one day I would be eventually living in that area and near the towns that I once visited as a child, and tourist! Years past, and my mother was determined to get us out of the city, she too longed  for something more, an escape from it all, no more hustle and bustle and rat race.....she wanted out of it all...it was a big chance, a big risk, others thought she was crazy for her idea (including my dad)....it took some time, some research, and several trips back up to those areas we enjoyed so much, and scouting out the perfect farm for our family....my dad was on board, but barely(he had to worry about making an income in the country, even though we'd rent out the land to a local farmer for income)....we had fun sorta, checking out farms, and the area...my parents made most of the trips themselves to scout things out....eventually narrowed it down to one farm...a lovely ninety acre cash crop farm one concession over from the beautiful shores of Lake Huron just north of Grand Bend....just perfect, prime land, ok old farm house, and near towns for school and hospital etc...they took it...we were moving, and moving fast....we sold our lovely home in the city, and packed everything up, and moved on my seventeenth birthday! Quite the birthday gift I'd say, and only the beginning of my life as "The Farmer's Wife".

~Rosemary~