Hey Friend!

Wow, can you believe it is back to school already?  We had a very different summer this year, but God’s hand was in all of it and I wouldn’t want it any other way.  If He is in the middle of whatever is happening, there is peace.  One of the many things I love about Fall is that even though here in MN things start to die, there is also a new and refreshing energy I feel.  I love the crispy air and sweatshirt weather and like it to last as long as possible before the deep freeze, but for me Fall is so abundant.  It is a very full season for us with all the garden produce, apple orchard harvest, bear hunting that starts at the beginning of September and then deer hunting.  This is when we store most of our food for the year, so it is very productive.  We only get bear tags every 6 years and our 15 year old daughter has one this year, so hoping for success for her as this will be her first one.  My husband gets pretty excited getting everything ready for the hunt which starts in August.  It really is such a blessing for them to get to experience it and I am so thankful they are so well rounded in so many areas of life and have more skills than 95% of their peers.  I truly believe they are going to be so much further in life with the every day life they have learned over the years.  From how to save on groceries and cook from scratch to hunting for food, processing it all along with all the life skills they learn on a homestead with animals!

I am so grateful for all of you that reach out and are loving the podcast and now the instagram content!  I am so so thankful for all of you-who knew this would grow so big just a few years ago when I had no idea what I was doing!  Just trying to share everything I know to live a simpler life.  Sometimes I feel like I’m failing you because I don’t have consistent content, but then I remember that I’m doing the Lord’s work and I don’t have to burn out or give up my values especially after last year and knowing that rest is needed.  Thank you for the grace.

So this summer we have been getting ready for next Spring as we will have a graduation here for our daughter that is a senior. We have been moving flower gardens(they were full of the most gorgeous flowers along with many thistles and grass that I couldn’t get rid of, so we made new garden beds for them. We have been staining and other miscellaneous things around here with the help of many Grandkids we have had over the summer with their daycares being off quite a bit which is fun ~ they just love it here and so fun for them to learn about the animals and milking, gathering eggs and all the fun that happens on a farm.  Most of our fencing and barn work is done for now and it helps to have portable electric fencing from premier one.  That works so nice for rotating the animals easily and often.

There was a time in June when I couldn’t get out of bed for 5 days, even lift my phone and I ended up having anaplasmosis, so glad I finally went in.  I’m a little stubborn knowing that most viruses they can’t do anything for, but after not getting better, I knew it had to be something other than the flu or covid and i didn’t even I had been bitten by a deer tick, but I did have several of them crawling on me at different times I hadn’t thought much of.  That took some time to recover from and then my husband’s job unexpected was off work for a while, so he ended up going to a different company putting in natural gas, so there has been alot of change around here.  My 15 year old started working in the spring as a phenomenal sourdough bakery that just opened up and she still needs rides, so glad it is only 15 minutes away and our other daughter is working in a kitchen at a resort, so they have been busy girls between working, sports, 2 large lawns they mow and numerous church camps.  It was just very different to not see them as much, but I am thankful to have such responsible kids.

We have seen God’s hand in all the hard things this summer and after testing instagram again for a couple months, my business grew really fast, so I’m working on creating more content to save you money and if you have not already, make sure you are following @claimingsimplicity on instagram.  I actually niched down to talking about cooking from scratch and how to cook dinners once a week for under &75 because that is what you wanted more of, so I’m slowly but surely working on some products around grandkids, kids, farm and all the fun that summer brings!

Now that we will get back to a semi normal routine, I hope to be back here weekly!  As always, please reach out with any topics or questions you have!

God Bless you!  Have a fantastic week!

Monica