RuthAnn & Elvin Zimmerman, Live in North east Iowa on 21 acres with our 7 children. They have lived on their acreage for 20 years now.
They have a couple different breeds of cows for milk and beef, Mangalitsa hogs, chickens and 2 Donkeys.
RuthAnns husband works full time but finds time to to the ‘heavy lifting’ of the homestead while her and the children do the day to day chores of the animals and in the summer in their 8000 sq feet garden planting, weeding and harvesting.
Their oldest child, Kristina, is married and lives near by, and their other children still live at home, ages 18,13,11,8,5,4.
Parenting is something I have a mere 20 years of experience in… I still feel like I’m learning so much every day, especially in the last 5 years since we’ve added 3 little boys to our family, 2 through adoption and a surprise, miracle pregnancy.
Having three of the same gender added to our family in 2 short years threw me in to survival mode as a mom in so many ways.
When a mom is in survival mode very little training or discipline actually gets done. When in survival mode we tend to always be ‘reacting from a place of frustration’ rather than responding to the situation according to the goal we have for our family!
When I, as a mom, recovered enough from our traumatic birth experience, next to zero sleep for 12 months, and the emotional upheaval, attachment struggles that come with adoption and started seeing the shape of the relationships among the young members of our family I fell to my knees weeping!!
First I was weeping with gratitude that God had spared my life and gifted us with these children and next I was weeping in self pity because I knew that the road out of this trench we were in was largely going to be up to me!
I cried out to Jesus for wisdom, I visited with fellow adoptive moms and recognized that I was suffering from PTSD. Not only from my near death experience but also from our foster care and adoption journeys.
Jesus is ever so grateful to know exactly what we need. He knew that he has created me to be an extremely goal oriented person and he gave me a goal for our family that has shaped the way I parent forever.
Our secondary goal (1st being that they accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior) for the family is that they would be able to have wonderful sibling relationships as adults! That when holidays roll around they would all bring their babies and we could spend peaceful and joyful times together. That when my husband and I are dead and gone, our children would remain close and have relationships with each other that bring both parties support and joy!!
This goal influences the way I parent every day! Its the reason we strive as parents to teach them how to properly and swiftly handle disputes and disagreements with little to no intervention from an adult from an early age.
Some of our children share ZERO DNA, and as wonderful as that can be in a family I also recognize that as adults these children may not have as much in common with each other as they do with the siblings that share their DNA. I recognize that it may take more effort for them to get along with some of their siblings than with others.
But what they do have in common is each other! And giving each of them the skills they need to have healthy, long term, functional relationships is the goal.
One of my biggest pet peeves is when I read an inspiring post or hear an inspiring sermon and there is no ‘application to real life’ part of the inspiration.
I’m left with ‘thats a great idea but what does it look like for me to apply that to my life!!’
So at the risk of sounding ‘self righteous’ and ‘legalistic’ and assuming you may have been inspired by my rambling way of sharing here is an example of how we work towards this goal in our family.
Number one, we make sure that ‘brothers are your friends’ and ‘we are a family’ and similar phrases are part of your everyday language.
Example:
They come tattling to me over an injustice.
I listen but rarely ask questions because when I question it gives them more opportunity to blame and point fingers at each other.
Calmly they are told to sit on their stool and are directed to ‘figure it out’
If its an object they are fighting over, they need to come up with a sharing plan that both parties are happy with.
If an injustice was inflicted by one party, an apology needs to be made and forgiveness offered.
Before they may continue with their play they need to come and show me their ‘joyful faces’ and each party tells me that they are happy with the continuance plan.
Sometimes they will have a hard time settling their disagreements and will actually be throwing punches, or pinching each others legs while they sit on their little stool.. as long as its not all out war I let it go for a bit but because I trust that they genuinely love each other and will only go so far with their physical fights.
If the discrepancy between them continues for a minute or so with no signs of peace i’ll usually set the timer and then dole out an appropriate punishment if they haven’t settled things in the set amount of time.
facts: my boys are 5,6&8 years old now and they know this drill so well that they very seldom need this intervention any more.
We started this when they were around 18mo-2 years old.
Disclaimers:
Our children are far from perfect and some days are still rough!!
As always, Remember that God gave you a mothering instinct that is worth more than any blog post, or book you can read!! Sure you may be inspired by things you read and thats a great way to gain ideas for your parenting journey.
But don’t let the noise of everyone that influences you drown out that God given instinct of motherhood!!!
Trust that instinct!!!
I am not well traveled. I’ve never flown on a plane. I’ve never been north of Ohio or west of Texas.I’m not as well traveled as some may say one should be, but this piece of land has housed all of my fondest memories…
Do you ever worry that your kids will miss out because of this homesteading lifestyle choice? This fear crosses my mind time to time. I’m sure many, if not most of you, could agree that it can be extremely difficult to get extended time away from the homestead for more than a full day, especially in the busy summer months when daily chores demand our regular attention…
“In some Native languages the term for plants translates to ‘those who take care of us’ … the land knows you, even when you are lost.” – Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass…
Babies, Business, and Bumper Crops: How I am Learning to Homestead with Babies in Tow
Have you ever had one of those days? You know the days when you are cleaning the baby’s diaper, milking the cow, scooping poop in the barn, wiping noses, and cleaning more poop off of kids’ shoes…
Hey there, Homesteading Mama’s!
I’m Rachel from @frontier_homesteading. My husband Ryan, three children and I have been homesteading for about 10 years now, first in Wyoming and now in Alaska.
We currently have milk goats, pack goats, sheep, a pig, a cow, chickens, rabbits, bees and a dog. Seasonally, we also have more pigs, meat chickens and turkeys….
Stained glass windows date back to the 7th century. With the earliest known reference dating
from 675 AD when workmen were imported from France to Britain to Glaze the windows of a
monastery…
Homesteading and growing food is not the easy way out of this life, i would say it is the hard way as there’s nothing convenient about it. It’s a lifestyle, a life change not a trend or hobby. Well, that’s my opinion any way…
Awakino Station is a child’s dream. There is the river to splash in, tussock covered hills to explore, animals to raise and a bustling kitchen with a baking tin full of something yummy to eat…
Like many in this homesteading space, this has been a completely unexpected journey for our family.
Even 10 years ago I would have laughed at the thought of getting up to milk a cow each morning and
canning endless amounts of tomatoes…
