Tuesday night I went with two friends and their children to the Story Book Forest Trail at one of our local lakes. The idea was actually very cute, the kids went down the forest trail and each stop was a scene from a children's tale, The Three Little Pigs, Little Miss Muffet, Sleeping Beauty, ect. Obviously it was aimed at the young set :), but after that was an area with games, a hayride and then we finished up with roasting marshmallows and/or hotdogs over a fire. We really enjoyed it. This was the third hayride of the season :) We took the kids a couple of weeks ago to the local Pumpkin Patch, which is actually more of a carnival on a horse farm, complete with a petting zoo, kettle corn, horse rides, bumper cars, a hayride and an actual pumpkin patch! Our second hayride was at a friend's house. The family puts together a hayride/hot dog roast for the 3rd -6th graders at our church, and the rest of us tag along and pretend we are that age. :) When I was growing up we lived out in the country. The houses were too far apart for our parents to let us walk from house to house, so our local dairy farmer would put together a hayride and take us from house to house. Unfortunately in Colorado, Halloween seems to be a perfect day for snow, so I don't remember actually getting to go very many times :) But I DO remember the matching clown outfits my mother made for my sister and I when I was a little tot. They were very cute, and I wore them for a long time since my sister was five years older! :) Lisa

Hi daisy08 and gardendaydreamer! I agree with how much fun it is to see all those little seeds sprouting... I was so excited when I learned about WS in the fall that I put mine out in November and then worried that I did it too soon but thankfully many of my pots have sprouted. I would have never thought to do something like this and I'm grateful to all the members who have shared their experiences (and reassured us first timers)

I am not my husband but I can tell you why he would not consider the sex and times I offered> He felt that i was using sex as a blackmail to get him to wait on things he did not want to wait for in the community. He said we were trying to Ransom his life and he was not paying the ransom when The sex did happen it was in no way the way i wanted in 2013> He had just come home from three years of rehab after MRSA in his spine and its complications. Had been in a stress center for two weeks. because of an incident that happened in the Rebab in 2012 when his father told him he again thought he was going to have his way when what he was really going to do was shut his face and just accept what was decided for him and that did not include a vacation ever, He flattened his father with a stainless steel bed pan to his face and he threw a full urinal at me telling me i had nothing ever to say about holidays and vacations. HE was done and would kill the first person that got in the way of his rights when he was out of rehab. When He got out of the stress center it was on the worst possible evening, I was getting ready to go to an Awards dinner as a promise to his mother, father, and his fathers best friend. I started out of my room and ran right into his chest and His first comment home was good i was ready to go out, He had not been out in 31 years. Where were we going!. He Knew full well we did not expect him home that day. I broke down Crying telling him I had promised that evening six months before and I could not add him to the table at that late hour. He just said well it looked like His parents and his fathers friend may as well get used to broken promises just as he had the last 31 year. Back off this or that and i promised him we would have the sex life and vacation as well as the holidays he earned and wanted and then when i came time to keep my promise where did he end up again. Filling for someone else taking his time and I would make the same stupid promise again expecting him to fall for it. He said Now the Bill was due and I was keeping 31 years of promises to him before I even thought was keeping any to any one else.. I was trying to hand him a 100 and get him to meet us anywhere he choose after the event. I just wanted a Civil discourse why things had happened as they had> He was not going to permit it and ripped my outfit to shreds and had his way about sex. Then he went after his fathers friend when he arrived and called my husband a crip and told him to get out of his way he was entering our home< He Through the man over the rail on our deck landing him face first in the Drive right in front of his fathers car. We think he was intending the man land in his mother and fathers lap. Over the years for everytime he w3as interfered with from @001 to 2009 he made sure somebody hurt over it even if he had to ambush some body. I Never understood why when his father and others used weapons to force him to work the holidays, Or when His father put his passport in his safe deposit to make him stay and work vacations Why he could not just Do as was requested and Take the times offered in exchange Instead of wait until the incident was finished and he worked then he would show up with a machinist sledge and break parts of people for daring to hold a weapon on him. I saw what he did to one man who thought drawing a pistol when he appeared at his home was going to stop his pain, My husband shattered the right hand, his arm up to the shoulder bad enough he lost his arm, all because he had wanted a holiday off and they forced him in at shotgun point. IN 2014 On Memorial day his father offered him 200 to stay away until we called him home. Before the end of the day he's taking a reservation my name was on away from another friend and telling his father he did not care if he was invited where I was invited he was to His father slapped him and called him stupid, His father flew over the kitchen island with the full force of a full fisted backhand breaking his jaw. He Had To be stopped from making the doorman at the club from getting his face ground into the pavement after pushing him to a public sidewalk and into the street. On the fourth of July that year they used Ketamine in a drink he had and Dumped him 30 miles out of Tow intending tio go back and get him later, HE Did Nor wait to embarrass everyone sending state police in To Search for the drug after they pumped his stomach. Two Friends were arrested in front of their families wives and children. They called it a joke, The police called it abduction with intent to do bodily harm and not a joke dumping a man in the middle of a county road and leaving him there drugged not with his consent. If My husband would have just talked to us then those men would be home with their kids instead of paying in prison for a joke. IN 2015 We were going on a cruise to Cancun My Husband Did Not care he was again not invited withy his rule if i was then he was.. It Made his father so angry he intended to use a ball bat to send him back home and stop hi9s defiance. His Father was hit so hard with an Upper cut before he took his swing it broke his neck. Latter in 2015I was offering the First Christmas dinner as a married man in 33 years, at home, To keep tensions down I gave him his plate and told him to go out to the barn and eat out there and if he wanted more I would get it at the back door He hit me in the face with the full plate yelling at me he was not some dam hand to e given charity. It Was his table , the food he had supplied and he was not eating in the cold barn.. He made everyone leave under the barrel of a 30 30 and I just stood and cried thinking why did it always have to be so hard to gain just a little cooperation. IF just one year we could have gone without defiance about sex, his work, and time out of the plant I think something that he wanted could have been worked out. I know after we ran into the problems within two years of his return home about vacation time, We had come back from ROME with a plan to Find A vacation starting after the New Year in 1988. I was thinking a nice beach and hotel for the same two weeks off in time it was just six months away. He Wanted me to keep the two promises i had made the last two years About sex And The mos5rt recent was any time, any where and any way he wanted, I Would Be both a Willing sex partner and travel companion if he stayed behind for that girl and her lazy fiancé to marry in ROME. I was not expecting him to want to drop everyone else at his fathers house and want to point the nose of the Van to Wyoming and His Grandfathers where he was from 1239 miles to the west. He had been hounded to go out there with me to introduce me. I just did not want a three week road trip after traveling all night from Rome, Every suggestion we mad for six months away was shot down. He Said did we realize he had not even seen the3 sun in seven years, What would he look like on a beach, probably a lobster. He got in the sun the first time In 2014 and he burned within five minutes so bad he blistered. I had no idea years ago when he left the Boats that sun was now a allergy for him.

new_frmr-"The property I'm looking at IS way out there; Greene county, NC. Is it too far for anyone to consider actually joining us? Is the idea too cost prohibitive to attain - ie, red tape to get rezoned, etc? Does this area of NC just possibly have no use for modern day, ex-traders turned hippies?" If you aren't from North Carolina (or the South) then you might want to do a little more investigating before you decide to move there. The countryside is beautiful but jobs are tough to find unless you have a particular skill (nursing, etc). I have family outside of Asheville. It took them years to integrate. 20 years later, they have good friends and neighbors, but it took alot of work to fit in. Several years ago I picked up a book called "How To Find Your Ideal Country Home". EXCELLENT book that describes what pitfalls to avoid when choosing what and where you want to settle. The author also has a website/forum. You might get some ideas there. Here is a letter to the author describing what overly bossy outsiders can expect. "Hi, Bumpy Gene, I'm from North Carolina, Greenville, to be exact, and we are overrun with Yankees! It's hard to find anybody with a southern drawl anymore. They have brought all of their big-city problems with them--crime, gangs, traffic gridlock, and a holier-than-thou attitude. I thank God for hot, steamy summers, lots of bugs, snakes, and so forth. I like to see 'em squirm (the Yankees that is!). Even after a major flood here last year they are still moving here by the hundreds every week. Nothing will deter them. It's colonialism--the natives suffer when the population influx begins. We are all in the "service economy" down here. Low-paying jobs to provide services for the rich SUV crowd. Thank God we just moved onto some family land which is in a trust (it can't be sold to make a subdivision for those outsiders). 100 acres and not a Yankee in sight! Yee-hah! Keep up the good work and take care. Sincerely, Sharon H. You Yankees might want to either steer clear of North Carolina or practice your drawl before you move down to Sharon's neck of the woods. She has friends." Go in with your eyes open! I like visiting N.C., but I don't think I'd want to live there. I've listed some websites you might find helpful. Good luck! Links that might be useful: GardenWeb-Homesteading Forum forums.gardenweb.com/forums/homest/ How To Find Your Ideal Country Home www.ruralize.com/ The Working Farm theworkingfarm.proboards.com/index.cgi? City Data www.city-data.com/forum/