Red Dirt Farm and Studio

When I was a little girl, I had a much clearer vision of my future.

I knew what I wanted, and how it was all going to work out.

This is my maternal Grandmother, the only photo I have of her.  I just recently received it.

 Though she passed many years before I was born, I knew her name.

 It rolled off my tongue like magic.

 Edith Ivy.

I decided that I was going to have a daughter and she would be named Edith Ivy.

I never had human children, only fur babies, none of them were ever named Edith Ivy.

Long before the TV series came out, my parents gave me for Christmas the series of

Little House On The Prairie Books.

A few of the books were missing at the time they were given, they were out of stock when my parents purchased them as a gift.

The day my parents took me to the book store to purchase the missing books, was like the sky opening up and I was in heaven.

I had a learning disability – it took an unusually long time for me to learn how to read.

I still can’t add 2+2 and get 4.

Receiving those books was an acknowledgment of my accomplishment.

I loved those books and read them over and over.

I fell in love with the name Charles Ingalls, and decided that I was going to marry a man named Charles.

In the mean time, the first sewing project I ever had  was to sew up a cat which I named Charles.

 He was a reddish pink color, you know printed on fabric and you cut out the design, stuffed it with poly fill and sewed it shut.

 I slept with Charles every night, until the real Charles came into my life and I married him.

At least that went according to plan.

 Although my Charles doesn’t look anything like Charles Ingalls, except even though this isn’t a color photo, you can tell he had beautiful eyes.

 My Charles has the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen on a man.

My paternal Grandparents lived in a big rock farm-house with a tin roof.

The shutters were painted red and white, the roof red and the front door too.

I took this photo, probably in the ’70’s.

Not visible in this photo is a wing in the back that housed the summer kitchen and the smoke house and a few other smaller rooms.

To the left, behind the big tree, is the big front porch, and a wing that housed the kitchen, and the only bathroom in the house.  Upstairs on that wing was my grandparents bedroom, and an attic.

I loved that house and going to visit there was the best place in the world.

Someday I was going to live in a big farm-house with a tin roof, paint it bright red and my front door was going to be red too.

We bought my dream farm-house.   It isn’t a big house, but it does have a tin roof.

Which we painted bright red and the front and back doors red and white.

Until the artist in me said I wanted something more colorful.

That is when the roof got painted a bright blue, the siding coral, the window trim and columns on the front porch purple and yellow.

The front and back doors remain red.

They really need a coat of paint on them that matches the rest of the house.

It is kind of hard to give up that dream though.  Recently I’ve been thinking about going back with a white house and red roof.

There were so many times when I was younger that I knew exactly how my life was going to happen.  I knew exactly what I wanted – and for the most part it happened.

I have had a great life with so many wonderful memories that fill my heart with joy.  Each and everyday I try to remember to be grateful for the people and the good that has filled my life.

Here lately, I’ve felt like I didn’t know what my path should be or how to go about attaining it.

 Still life is very good.

I really need to find that little girl and have a talk with her, maybe she has some advice for me.

When you were a child did you have dreams that you wanted to achieve?

Have you?

See you later,

Bye!

Kim