Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Are you all ready for Christmas? We are not and I’m ok with that. The kids wanted to decorate right after Thanksgiving, but I wanted to hold off until the first week of Advent was over, now we’re into the second week and nothings done yet. Wait, one of the kids strung up a set of lights in the dining room, “until we get time to do it all mom.” The rate we’re going, we’ll be setting it up on Christmas Eve after we do all our shopping.

What are you doing that’s special for Christmas? Getting together with friends and family? We had a little neighborhood get together on Thanksgiving night around 10 p.m. when I saw a few cows run past my kitchen window as I cleaned up the dishes. At first, I saw one, then I saw ten. After that there was a whole lot of coveralls flying around, while others yelled “take my boots off and find your own!” We had 85 head out, and one stubborn one was out for three days and ended up six miles from our place. That next day all the longhorns were taken out of the feedlot and sold. We think that one of them got her horn in the gate and flipped it off the pins. But we were due, we hadn’t had cows out in a long time.

For Christmas, we aren’t going anywhere, and I love that for us. Nothing beats time at home when you’re a big busy family that’s running all over for everything. I always said I could be a hermit on the side of a mountain. Around this time when I’m filling orders off our website, teaching felting, running after kids’ stuff and helping Ron, quiet nights at home are so great.

But I’ve got something for you. A little peek at our holidays. You know, in case you’ve never had a big family holiday and you’re wondering what Christmas is like for us in particular, well here, I’ll lay it out for you. It starts the Sunday after Thanksgiving after lunch we all write our Christmas lists and put them on the cupboard doors.

This year, I really encouraged everybody to make presents. Some of our family members do that already, but this year, I think everyone is feeling the pinch and let’s face it, handmade gifts are super special. Some things that get made in our house are quilts or blankets, stuffed or felted animals, paintings, frames for pictures, embroidered towels, keepsake boxes, jewelry, this year I made my sisters some room spray with essential oils, etc…the list goes on. If you look on Pinterest, Tik Tok, go to the library, there’s so much you can make for gifts and it seriously doesn’t have to cost much, if literally anything at all, except your time. Giving is what’s important. If you teach your child to give, well that’s a valuable lesson for sure.

Next, we celebrate Christmas Eve with an appetizer meal that everyone is responsible for. Each kid, even when they were small, got to pick an item to make and then they write that down on the cupboard list along with their grocery list and they make it on Christmas Eve. Oh and it has to be Christmas themed. Then Santa comes, knocks on the door with a letter, and the kids have to go find their presents in a barn or shed in the dark. I thought this year we’d maybe not do that tradition and I had some MAD adult kids, lol. So we’re gonna do it! We eat all night, open up presents one at a time from youngest to oldest (with 14 people it’s crazy) then we clean up and go to church in the morning.

So in the end, if you don’t have traditions, get some. Your family will love it. Make some gifts with love. If you don’t have people to give to, give to a neighbor. If you have no place to go, ask someone if you can come over. And above all else, double chain your cattle gates on a holiday. It’s hard finding someone to help when they’re in the warm bed with a belly full of goodies.
Until next time,
Fairchild “I sure appreciate you all!” Farmgirl

Suzanne Fairchild is a freelance writer who lives on a farm in southwest Minnesota with her husband and children. She can be reached at rmf@itctel.com.

When did 2024 diminish right before our eyes? Side note: we have roughly 50 some days to make this the best year yet in case you haven’t done so, there’s still time!

As usual, we’ve been busier than a moth in a sweater closet. Ron has been working all hours to get farming done for the season for the guy he works for, some small jobs in the shop and keeping up with this place and the kids. I’ve been doing a ton of needle felting classes and have kept really busy gearing up for that and the Christmas season in general.

For about a month I’ve been trying to build up product for a particular show and this past week, I’ve really had to put the hammer down and get things done.  So when Ron asked me to come along to pick up a Scottish Highland cow/calf pair, I kind of thought, ‘don’t I look busy enough?’ But I went anyway, because we only have these kids here for so long right? Right.

The trip up to Webster, S.D. started out fine enough, but soon enough the cloudy sky turned to rain and besides that, we were lost. How we get lost going up to this place I have no idea. We’ve been there three times before. Ron started looking for a “red shed that is right around here, then when you see it you take a right,” I think I remember seeing water on either side of the road, and Jess is in back fast asleep.

As before, Google is no good in Prairie Pothole Country, so it takes us about 10 miles away from our destination – again (and yet we don’t learn from our previous mistakes). It was really raining at this point, and did I tell you that we’d spent about 30 minutes on gravel when let’s be honest, there’s so much standing water in places, we should have taken a canoe. I call the guy and tell him to drop his pin to my phone so I can see where he’s at. I then proceed not to read the whole text (which again, in alignment with previous mistakes) and my phone takes us to the road before the one that he told us to take. We take the google approved road, and we see this black sign that’s written with what looks like white crayon (seriously) it says, “Road closed” in cursive.

If you know Ron, he’s no quitter. “How bad could it be?” he asks. Well soon the road turned into a basic trail with grass growing in the center and we get to the top of a hill and look down, the road narrows to one lane with water on each side. I start looking for a place that we could turn the pickup and trailer around. Nothing. No approaches of any kind. So as we go over this mess of water, I look in my mirror to see mere inches between the trailer wheels and water. We made it through. Whew!

After we get loaded, Ron asked the guys about the red shed…they’ve no knowledge of it. Me? I think it was a Prairie Pothole Mirage, Ron. Something you think you see when you’re lost on a 30 mile stretch of gravel. We cut them a check and leave. The rain picked up and we decided to get home via Summit to Milbank to Ortonville then home.

Oh, the Summit hill country. Why is the weather 20 times worse up there? As if a switch flipped, it suddenly became very foggy. It was so awful and you could cut it with a knife. We stopped at the truck stop to get supper and for a fleeting second I actually thought my hubby may want to eat there and not in the truck, well for obvious reasons. Nope. Ron got a sandwich, Jess got some pasta from Pizza Hut and I got an order of breadsticks to share.

As we were leaving, we literally had to go off my phone to see where the end of the truck stop driveway was to get on the road. It was horrible. In the next ten minutes I realize either how talented of a driver my hubby is, he has a four leaf clover in his pocket or how he truly has no fear. “Turn the light on so I can dip my breadsticks. Oh my gosh, you’re driving!” I yell.

But like always, we made it home flawlessly. I used to say it was the kids that gave me gray hair, but now I’m not so sure.

Keep yer vehicle on the road and have a great Thanksgiving. We truly have much to be thankful for.

Until next time,
Fairchild “Oh, if you’re wondering, that pair sure is pretty!” Farmgirl


Suzanne Fairchild is a freelance writer who lives on a farm in southwest Minnesota with her husband and children. She can be reached at rmf@itctel.com.

I’m beginning to think we’ll never have frost on the pumpkin, because it’s too dry to make even frost…or maybe I don’t understand science and it doesn’t work that way. Nevertheless, it’s pretty dry out there and we sure could use some rain.

I still am liking the warm temps though, because even though I haven’t watered my flowers in a hot minute, my hollyhocks are covered in blooms as well as the zinnias. Just gorgeous! I need to water my dahlias as well, but you know how it is… “oh, the garden? Yeah, I haven’t been out there in a while,” I say, as I see the weeds are waist high in parts and putting out seed. My favorite saying, “look with a blind eye.”

The rest of the farm is rolling along. As we wrap up this season’s farmers markets, our young chickens are finally starting to lay eggs. Isn’t that convenient? We were short all summer, we had excuses like, “it’s too hot,” “it’s too wet” (we can’t use that excuse anymore), “maybe they’re not getting what they need mineral wise” (I bought them a block for chickens, they ate it up I bought a couple more, NOTHING).

The excuse was really that they’re too old and we have them outside running everywhere just being happy chickens. We probably have a thousand eggs around the farm in the weeds and that would explain the massive amounts of raccoons and skunks we’ve had all summer. What do ya do? Keep them shut inside all day and night? Not here. I like watching them dust bathe in the driveway and eat bugs while I’m doing dishes. And what’s better than a hundred chickens running up to you when you leave the house thinking you’ve got some vegetable scraps? Probably a lot of things if you don’t care about chickens running up your leg. That should be some kind of phobia I should think. I digress. The only one who really doesn’t like them all over is Tedd because they poop on his “basketball court.” I mean I get it, bouncing a ball in fresh chicken poop isn’t as cool as you may think.

Speaking of chickens, I feel like this place could be a real gold mine. I bet Ron and I don’t even know what we have. I mean, yeah, there’s love and all that, the kids, I’m a good cook, he likes to make me things when he gets a wild hair, but seriously. I saw an Airbnb that was on a farm, and you slept in the chicken coop. Actually, it’s built to look like a coop, but it’s a new building. But one side is plexi-glass so you can watch the chickens all day if you want. Plus, you can pay extra to do chicken chores, wash eggs, clean the real coop…among whatever else you may fancy on a full-fledged chicken ranch.

As I sit here and think about this, I bet my kids would pay our guests out of their very own pockets to clean the coop. More than likely, they’d probably sit there and micromanage the guests like their dad does them. “Hey, you think that corner’s clean? Look again. We have all the time in the world.” Bahaha!

Then, I could cook them breakfast and charge them for it. What would be on the menu? Eggs of course, unless the raccoons got to the real coop first. Maybe I could charge the guests to be on night watch.

Oh the ideas! But until we get the Fairchild Ranchero turned into the Fairchild’s Chicken Stay n Play, we’ll just have to stick to the stuff that’s been working, like Ron farming for someone, I’m subbing for school, writing these articles for your utter enjoyment and hawking my handmade wares at craft shows.

But you best believe, I’m planning something.
Until next time,
Fairchild Farmgirl

Suzanne Fairchild is a freelance writer who lives on a farm in southwest Minnesota with her husband and children. She can be reached at rmf@itctel.com.

Well friends I had to look at the date on my computer screen tonight and was floored that we’re already a week and a day into September. I know we’re here, but it’s crazy is it not?
One minute were chillaxin with the kids having a bonfire or reading a book, then the next minute we’re getting everyone on the road to school and getting a load of laundry before I head out to sub for a different school with a literal jug of coffee. Oh and Ron is out working or doing something for our farm.

September is like Christmas. You know it’s coming with all the commitments and everything but until it’s a week before its hitting, you’re just hanging out and BAM! It hits you like a bus.

A school bus. This year, we have a senior, a junior, a sophomore, a freshman and a sixth grader. We just sent Grace back for her second year of college.

Right now, we’re knee deep in watching the boys play football, going to Tedd’s practices, I’m subbing for Deuel, CCD starts this month in Clear Lake for us, and Ron’s getting ready to help in harvest. I’m also gearing up for a monster of a fourth quarter in my business.  And would you believe we entertained the idea of another foreign exchange student? My kids want another one, and I kind of did for a hot minute. Then the first week of school hit and I now know better. Not with my schedule…maybe next year.

Also, I’m hitting the Minnesota public library system pretty hard with my needle felting classes. Shout out to the Worthington Library where we had a full class and some fun ladies had joined who read this column. What a ball! This month I only have one library (Lamberton) but then I have ten in October. So much fun! I sure have met some wonderful people. If you’d like to have a class for a library, a group you belong to or a work team building/fun day, get a hold of me. We have fun.

Other than that, we’re trying to get the summer/fall work done around the house and farm. This past weekend we scraped paint on the porch and balcony and finished painting the first level porch. If you’re familiar with an “American Foursquare,” then you know our house.  It’s a big one with an upper balcony that sits over a large porch. It’s neat upstairs on the balcony because there’s a great view of the farm, but as I was scraping the ceiling of it, I have to say the thought crossed my mind about having someone else paint it. It’s scary up there and I’m not a heights person and neither are four of the six kids that are here. Levi being the natural born dare devil, was finally offered $150 to paint it.
He was interested, but we’re still in the scraping phase however and that kid...he was sitting on the railing, hanging out trying to scrape the outer edge of the roof that’s painted. I couldn’t look anymore, so I went downstairs to make dinner. I also reminded him that the ground doesn’t forgive if he fell. In my mind I see someone else doing it, you know, a professional that has a harness or something other than the luck that my kid thinks he has an endless supply of.

One more exciting thing, they should be finishing up my wool at the mill so I can FINALLY get some dryer balls, and kits in bulk made. The most wool I’ve ever sent out is about 200 pounds and got 150 pounds back. But now this, twelve hundred pounds plus or minus went to the scouring plant in May. Five hundred ninety-two pounds got sent from the plant in Texas to mill in Wisconsin. I’m super curious to see the pounds I get back and just to see all that wool into roving is going to be crazy. Also…I need to figure out how it’s getting back here. Ron is hinting about going to pick it up…that may be another story for you next month. Stay tuned!
Until next time,

Fairchild “that’ll be a lotta dryerballs, you betchya!” Farmgirl

Suzanne Fairchild is a freelance writer who lives on a farm in southwest Minnesota with her husband and children. She can be reached at rmf@itctel.com.

It can't be August! It was just July 1 and you can't tell me any different. Although, I guess we did have a full July which made it go by so fast. Here's the skinny on what's been happening. We took our senior daughter to SDSU, we also looked at some horse boarding places in case she'd want to have her horse close, (side note: we need to start a boarding facility, that's where the cash is at) we also are looking into some places that she can apply to work at next summer/fall. We're getting ready to move Grace up to Watertown she's transferring to Lake Area. The other kids are working like crazy to supplement their winter school months, car dreams and college savings accounts.
Tedd and I have been selling out of our flowers each week at the market, and rightfully so; how could you not buy from a sweet kid who can tell you about our wildflower hunting Friday morning escapades to put in our bouquets? Or the fact that he knows the names to all the flowers that we raise and pick in the wild?
As for here at the ranchero, we've been doing a little operation clean up around here and that started with the old Ranger Crew side by side. If we're not using it, well, get rid of it. I will say, I was a slight bit sentimental when they were loading it on the trailer. The times that we loaded all the kids on it and took it to the park or just took drives on it, hauled calves in the box from the feedlot, well it was a good ride. But we're sick of putting money into it. I will say though, my new motto is to throw my hand in the air, pointing eastward to Marshall and yell, "to the scrapyard!" We actually sold the side-by-side to a person, but one son is hauling a few cars down for scrap and we have to bring another sizable pile down. If I hear, "well scraps not worth a whole lot," I'll either be questioning my marriage or sanity. Kidding…maybe.
However, the most exciting thing this month besides taking the kids out to see the new movie Twister and going out for supper was the purchase of a new to us riding lawn mower. We have been mowing our lawn with a push…and mostly it's been me, let's be honest. Every time I ask a kid, they're mentioning to me about the steps that I'm always wanting to get in on the daily. Confession time: I really love doing lawn work, so it doesn't bother me a whole lot.
On our summer bucket list was to take the kids somewhere before school starts, but with football starting, some school shopping left, Grace going back to college, and some more college visits with our junior and senior, it's not looking great. We also haven't painted the porches and trim yet on the house and I am telling you, we need to do it! That and wash the windows and casings. Have you ever really looked on the outside of your windows lately? Ours are covered in spider webs and fly poop…well not covered, but you get the gist, it's grody and needs a power washing, as well as the siding too.
But I will say, I'm very excited for fall. I love football, chilly days, soup, all the things. I'm also going to sub for my second year across the border in South Dakota. I LOVE it. The kids are a blast and the great thing about subbing is, it's always different. The only thing I would love, is to be able to sub in Minnesota, but since I only have an Applied Science degree and not a Bachelor's degree, I can't. So for now, I'll stay in South Dakota. But if you have the credentials and you are thinking about it, do it. Subbing is a blast, and working with students is really rewarding. My favorite is the high school kids… those pre K-6th graders are tough on this old lady, but I do still love to see all those smiley faces.
Back to the grind. I have been thinking about all the years that I've done monthly articles and I love sharing my life with all of you. You, my readers, make it all worth it. Have a great month!

Until next time,
Fairchild "enough of this sap… send it to Marshall!" Farmgirl

Suzanne Fairchild is a freelance writer who lives on a farm in southwest Minnesota with her husband and children. She can be reached at rmf@itctel.com.