I have such vivid memories as a kid with my mom cross-legged on the living room floor, the smell of cinnamon sticks boiling on the stove and Christmas music blaring, as she made the prettiest bows to adorn our Christmas presents. It’s a memory that I treasure and have continued in her tradition as I’ve grown up and started my own family. As I’m pulling out the Christmas ribbon to prepare for our holiday selling season,
What makes country music different from any other genre of music is the honest, emotional, stories that are consistent across all demographics. The great songwriter, Harlan Howard, described country music as “Three Chords and the Truth”. The songs we hear in country music tell stories about love and loss, and every decade or so, a song is written that makes us hold our breath with lyrics that rip open a corner of our hearts. This song yanks buried emotions to the surface and allows us to empathize with the song-writer/singer on a very personal depth. Craig Morgan has recently written and recorded a song that will be remembered alongside the select few songs that are woven into the fabric of what makes up country music.
Progress, not perfection. This has been a theme in our lives lately. Our good friend Deborah is a nutritionist we are working with and she introduced us to this mantra which has definitely been an encouragement over the past few weeks.
This weekend was hard. I’ve been dreading it for months. I didn’t grow up hunting animals. I’ve never eaten an animal that I’ve harvested. I do remember my brother cleaning a deer at my Grandparents’ house one Thanksgiving. It was a pretty traumatic experience just being on the periphery. It wasn’t a process I ever wanted to participate in. When we bought the farm, one of our goals was to be self-sustainable. We dreamed of stocking our pantry and our freezer with vegetables and meat that we had grown here on the farm. We know we’ll always have to go to the grocery store for certain things. After all, we don’t grow avocados in Arkansas. And everybody loves guacamole, right?
