Spring has sprung and the weather has taken a turn towards warm! We have started our garden plans and we have even planted our tomato and pepper plants! We have decided to have raised beds this year, we have not had much luck the past few years with our traditional garden. We needed a change that will hopefully help us achieve our garden dreams! I always become so excited this time of year to get our gardens going. I love to get my hands dirty in the wonderful soil that will supply our table with such beautiful foods. I cannot wait to bite into that very first tomato fresh from the vine, we all stand at the gardens edge sharing that first bite. The colors that emanate from the garden are in so many ways more beautiful than a flower garden. They are bright, vibrant and delicious. I am hoping that this year we will have a bountiful harvest. I want to be able to share our gorgeous stripped heirloom tomatoes with friends and we would love to actually get enough pumpkins to sell when the leaves begin to turn. Our cucumbers, beans and summer squash will line our pantry shelves neatly tucked inside their glass jars, our basil will lay between slices of juicy Big Boy tomatoes and fresh mozzarella cheese, our red ripe strawberry will share the spotlight with fresh whipped cream atop a tender slice of angel food cake. Those are the things that garden dreams are made of! Those are the memories I have from the gardens my parents always had. Rows and rows of every kind of fruit and vegetable you could possibly ever imagine and never a weed in sight. I will succeed this year and I will love every second of the journey.

I had the opportunity to attend the "Harvest New England Agricultural Marketing Conference & Trade Show" on Wednesday 2/25  and Thursday 2/26 in Sturbridge, MA. To say it was packed full with information is an understatement! The sessions offered were a pleasure to attend and I find myself longing for the next one. This was the first "farming" event my husband and I have attended, it surely will not be the last. We had no expectations just interest, but walked away with a new-found rejuvenation for the dream that brought us to the place that we currently stand within our lives. We are at a cross-road brought upon by the hope and reality that was given to us at this conference. Do we continue on the road we are traveling, the safe, straight paved road that includes pieces of our dream or do we take the winding country road that ultimately is our dream. The dream of our own farm filled with gardens, rolling fields, pastures full of livestock and our bakery. A place for our children to run and fly through the air on a rope swing. This life that requires hard work, dedication and selfless responsibility. A more self sustainable life, a life that truly is "our own" in so many more ways than we could imagine, a life and living that we earned and worked hard for. We did not walk away with the disillusion that any of this is easy, but that it is obtainable and we are capable of making our dream a reality. All we need now is the courage to take the leap and jump into a new, unknown but much wanted way of living.

This is the month when you take a moment and look at all the things in your life you are thankful for. I am taking great pleasure in doing this, especially  this year.
My life is full and busy, but with a new kind of full and busy! Many new things have happened and come to fruition in the last year. We have started our little brood
of laying hens, added some beautiful Araucanian's, some pretty little Bantams and of course our puppy - Ruby. My children seem to have settled into a different more peaceful existence. Ruby, on occasion, stirs up the pot with her "puppy energy", but most of the time she can put us on the floor with laughter. My shining moment this past year is the birth of my absolutely perfect and beautiful son. He amazes each of us everyday with every single thing he does. The excitement and pure wonder in each of his discoveries is absolute delight to witness. To watch my older four children fall so in love with such a little being is beyond words.

We have taken the first steps in our ever yearning desire to have our own little farm. We figured we would also incorporate what I love doing, baking, and turn it into a little business. Please visit our web-site at www.millixfamilyfarm.com. We had the pleasure of being invited to the Coventry Farmers Market for the last three weeks of the season. It was great and we cannot wait to go back next year, full-time. The people we had the opportunity to meet and learn from was such a pleasure. The location was the perfect place to spend a Sunday afternoon, and a place for three generations of my family to reconnect.

I guess to sum it all up, I am so thankful for all that life has blessed me with. I have five beautiful, healthy children. I am watching a "someday I would love to...." moment come to be, our little farm and bakery, and the opportunity to simply spend time doing what I love with the people I love the most. I have learned from people I have come to know and their unimaginable tragedy that you should be thankful every day for everything in your life, especially the "little" things that you are blessed with. I am "Thankful" - every day and every moment of my life for the over flowing plate that sits in front of me and for all the people who add to it.