It's always good to stop and regroup.

Last year I paused.  It had been nine years since I jumped in.  I was burnt out, I was overtired, it seemed like nothing was going right and that I had failed at everything I had tried.  My marriage was in a downward spiral.  It felt like I was drowning in my to-do list.  I couldn't get ahead no matter how hard I tried, how much I scrimped, what I did cut the budget or scrounge out some extra time.  I had been in a pretty rough spot since the summer of 2014.

For 2015 I decided I wasn't going to take on anything new.  I took some time to regroup, review all of the activities I had tried, those that were successful, those that failed, what I wanted to do going forward, what I absolutely didn't want to try again and what I could accomplish completely on my own.

I faced difficult questions from my friends and family - 

• Why are you so dead set on having a farm?
• A farm is hard work and you aren't getting any younger?
• You know that having animals means you can't leave for the weekend?
• You haven't been successful so far, why are you even still considering this?

Through all the negativity, there is still a lot of positive.  I tried.  A lot of people can't even say that.  My husband called them learning experiences, expensive ones at that.  But I have learned A LOT over the course of nine years.  I learned how to do a few things REALLY well.  I also learned a lot about how to not to do other things.

2016 will be the year I re-invest myself into this farm.  Little man is old enough that he can help a little more and not need to be entertained every minute of every day.  I am determined to be here when he gets off the school bus.  I have a couple years to make that dream come to fruition.

I revisited a post from January of last year - 

Growing Magazine had one sentence that justified my lists this month: 

Setting goals before each season is the only way to know at the end of the year whether you succeeded.

The three things I will be focused on are vegetables, chickens and Christmas trees.  So the lists have begun - like this one of the current inventory of vegetable seed.  Orders will be placed this weekend for the ones I need to get going again.  Yesterday, another package arrived for the poultry venture.

Baby steps.