I've got some new readers, so I thought I might take the opportunity to introduce myself a little more formally and give a little background on life as we know it.

My name is Hannah and this is my blog...Farmhouse654.

I've been married to Mr. Farmhouse for almost 14 years.  We started out life in an adorable two-bedroom home in town and stayed there for over two years, before moving to a ranch-style home on four acres outside of town.  We did lots of updates to that home and property and absolutely loved every minute there.  We were completely content, except for the fact that our three girls shared two bedrooms and it was getting just a little bit tight as they continued to grow.

We had so many great memories in that house. 

We brought all three of our daughters home there. 
We raised bottle-calves, pigs, and chickens there. 
We spent 10 Christmas mornings there.

We made updates to the house, added a few outbuildings, and even survived a tornado that picked up one of our barns and threw it to the other side of the property.

Our second home was such a special part of our journey.

However, in May of 2017, an opportunity presented itself for us to sell that home and buy a farmhouse on ten acres.

So in July of last year (after some bumps in the road), we made the farmhouse our home.

And that was the start of Farmhouse654.

Now...a little background on the wife & mom of the family who lives here.

Mr. Farmhouse and I grew up right here in this town. 

We are hometown kids and I can't imagine raising our girls anywhere else.

Our girls are eleven, (almost) nine, and three.

They are so alike and so different in so many ways.

We love Jesus and love our church.

We believe that God's calling for us is to love Him and to love people.

We try hard to do this, but fail miserably a lot of the time.  We're thankful for grace!

I've been a teacher for the last twelve years and will be leaving the classroom in May to move into the position of the Director of Special Services in the district where I currently teach.  I run a photography business on the side and work for my parents, who own group homes for adults with disabilities.

We are busy and blessed.

The girls are involved in our church, play sports, take dance classes, and enjoy piano & guitar lessons once a week.  

We love to be outdoors and spend time often just sitting around in lawn chairs in the back yard watching the girls play basketball or shoot skeet.

When I have some free time, I like to document our journey through this blog.

So there you have it.

Some of where we've been and where we are now.

Someday I'll tell you all about where we're headed...our goals and dreams for the farmhouse.

But for today, I'll just go rock our sweet Mattie-girl while we watch another Barbie movie.

Make it a great Monday, friends.

​❤️🏡❤️

This is a big one, folks.

This post will be unlike any post I've ever written.

Yesterday, a student asked me about the situation and I decided it was probably time to let the cat out of the bag.

My colleagues and my family, along with some friends, already know my big news.

However, I feel like posting it on the blog makes it public knowledge and that can only mean one thing...

This is really happening.

After thirteen years as a teacher of one kind or another, I'll be leaving the classroom.

With any transition, there will be some sorrow...some difficulty.

But there will also be joy, excitement, reflection, and new ideas.

I am so thankful to be able to stay in my current district.  I've grown so much as an educator and met so many people who are near and dear to my heart.

I'm grateful to my principal for pushing me to go back to school,
our superintendent for encouraging me to move forward,
our school board for giving me this opportunity,
our current special education director for training me,
my mentor special education director from my alma mater,
my colleagues (current and former) for believing in me,
the two fourth grade teachers in my building that make up the other half of our team for offering so much encouragement this year, 
my teaching partner for all of his support through the years...especially this year,
my friends,
my family...our parents, grandparents, and siblings, 
my dear Mr. Farmhouse and our three sweet girls.

I'm grateful for my students & their parents through all of my teaching years.
For the life lessons that I have learned standing in front of that classroom.
For the opportunities to grow and develop into the educator I am today.

I'm just so very grateful.

​Life will be different here in the farmhouse in just a few short months.

For now though, I'm going to enjoy the time I have left this year with my darling third graders...shaping young minds.  Laughing with them and cheering with them.  Helping them along and making sure to let them know how much they help me along, too.

January 9th marked our six-month anniversary of our "first night sleeping at the farmhouse".

Six months.

In some ways, it feels like that was ages ago...and in some ways, it feels like yesterday.

Over the snow days (and ice day and really cold wind-chill day) that we had off of school last week, I really reminisced about our time here at the farmhouse so far.

I started looking through some of my old blog posts and Instagram photos.

One of my most favorite memories for the rest of my life will be from 9:00 at night on the first Saturday night that we slept here.

Our minister and his wife came out and prayed over the farmhouse.  You can read about it in my blog post from that day...Bless this Mess.

Since that warm July night,
we have enjoyed family movie nights cuddled in the living room,
mornings on the front porch reading our books,
pick-up games of basketball out to the north of the house,
friends over to BBQ,
softball practice out in the yard,
and for Thanksgiving we hosted our first TWO family dinners out here.

We experienced our first farmhouse Christmas with the girls.

We have painted and decorated,
Added an upstairs bathroom,
Tore down a barn,
Added a chicken coop,
Purged belongings,
Purchased furniture.

It has been quite the journey and I know we are nowhere near "finished".

Mr. Farmhouse has been working tirelessly in all of his spare time to get the girls a second bathroom.

We paid a buddy of ours to do the rough-in work and plumbing (thanks, Brent!), but Mr. Farmhouse decided he could finish the rest out himself.

With lots of help from our dads, we have finished the sheetrock, cement board for the tile, and wiring.

Next up is paint,
then putting in the vanity & sink,
finishing the accent wall with barn wood & metal from the barn that is lying beside our house,
the tile work,
​and installing the toilet & plumbing fixtures.

"How many sentences do I need to write to get a good grade?"

One of my third graders asked me this a few weeks ago when we started to write our first big writing assignment...the personal narrative.

"There's not really a certain number of sentences...I just want you to tell the whole story. The beginning, the middle, and the end. I want to be able to picture the story in my head as I read your words and I want you to take your time adding details to help paint a mental picture for your readers."

"Okay," he said, "So how many sentences would that be?"

I wish I could say that it's only 8-year-olds who are asking, "How good is good enough?"

But you and I both know that's not the case.

I think that in most avenues of life, the bare minimum should not be the standard by which we judge ourselves.

For the last four years or so, my teaching partner and I have departmentalized our instruction. He has taught the math and science while I've taught the reading, writing, and social studies.

We were very comfortable in our roles. We worked together to meet the needs of each third grader in our building and we supported each other in our various responsibilities.

To be frank...it worked really well for us.

We had seen growth in our test scores and felt like we were in each of our elements as we shared pertinent information with our third graders, using our own teaching styles and meeting our kids' learning needs.

Last year, a team from our school (including me) visited an elementary building near Columbia, Missouri, to observe how their multi-age model of teaching worked.

We were blown away by so many parts of the program and decided that it was definitely worth looking into for our own school.

We had meetings and planned and talked and spent time hashing out the details of how a program like this would work for our own district.

Ultimately, last winter, we decided to move towards this model for the 2017-2018 school year.

That meant lots of changes for the third grade team.

We were each going to be teaching all subjects.

We were teaming up with two other teachers.

We were moving to a model that would require us to hit both third and fourth grade learning standards during the course of the school year.

It would be a challenge, but we were ready.

We met with our team last spring on several occasions to align our standards, to share resources and teaching strategies, and to decide how our students and teaching responsibilities would be divided.

​I was feeling good about the school year going into summer.

And then...our house didn't sell when it was supposed to sell.

We ended up having to jump through a lot of hoops by doing a lot of extra inspections on the farmhouse.

My Dave Ramsey car ("Dave") needed repairs and the air conditioning went out of the Yukon ("Ramsey").

When the first few weeks of the school year came, I didn't feel refreshed or relaxed or prepared in the least.

Nevertheless, we jumped in head first.

Our team refreshed ourselves on everything we had talked about in the spring.

We shared resources and ideas (again) and encouraged one another as we transitioned to this new way of teaching.

I knew the research showed that this model would be the best thing for kids.

I knew that we were capable of carrying out this model of teaching.

​I knew that I would hold myself to the same standard of excellence that I had insisted on keeping for my whole teaching career.

And then...the students came.

The first few days were great.  

We did lots of team-building activities, where all the third and fourth grade students met together.  The four of us teachers were able to play off of each other in conversation about being a good leader and being scholarly.

The first few weeks came and went and we split into our own classrooms, teaching our own subjects, to our own specific group of students.

I started to realize that maybe this wasn't going to come as naturally to me as the years before.

A new curriculum.
A new group of students.
A new school for our own two daughters.
A new house (that we weren't all-the-way moved into yet).

I was overwhelmed with being a wife and a mom and a teacher.

I was questioning my own ability in the classroom.  

This had literally never happened to me.

I love my job.
I live to go back to school.
I smile and encourage and show enthusiasm.

It's what I do.

Or what I have done every year of my teaching career so far.

But this year...I felt like I was falling behind from the get-go.  

In all areas.

​Until one day, a friend of mine said to me, "You know...sometimes you just have to let some things go."

What?  
Let some things go?  
Sorry, that actually doesn't work for me.  
I don't just "let things go".

When I took a moment and really thought about it though...she was right.

Sometimes good enough is actually good enough.

Sometimes laundry folded in baskets at the bottom of the stairs instead of put away into drawers is good enough.

Sometimes a Happy Meal from McDonalds on the way home instead of a home-cooked meal is good enough.

Sometimes putting the toddler to bed after wiping her down with a baby wipe instead of actually giving her a bath is good enough.

Sometimes taking one whole Saturday morning to catch up on grading papers instead of doing it every evening is good enough.

I'm not suggesting that we lower the standard for everything in life to "good enough".

I think sometimes we have to realize that even when we're not feeling able to be our very best, we can still do good in the world.

Even when we're struggling to keep afloat, we can make a difference.

Even when we don't feel like we can reach the standard of excellence that we usually strive for...sometimes good enough is good enough.

Today was day #5 of my school year, but day #1 for the girls.

This year, I have a third grader and a fifth grader. 

How.
Did.
That.
​Happen???

This year, Claire Bear decided to join Harlee and attend school at the alma mater of Mr. Farmhouse and I.

We knew this would happen eventually.

We wanted them to become Adrian Blackhawks eventually.

But here we are.

Here I am.

I drop them off at 6:30 a.m. to various family members and I drive out of town.

I arrive at school by myself.

I get ready for my day.

I teach.

After school, no children come into my room to tell me about their day.
Nobody asks me for snacks.
Nobody complains that I'm taking too long or that they're ready to go.

I do what I need to do in the peace and quiet.
Too peaceful and too quiet.

I miss them.

I'm so excited for what they are going to do this year. 

The ways they'll grow.
The things they'll learn.
The relationships they'll build.

This is a year of many firsts.

Things are changing at the farmhouse and I'm trying hard to embrace it.
To enjoy the transitions and embrace the subtle differences that I'm seeing every day in the girls.

The truth is though...sometimes I'd like to just have them back in kindergarten, sticking their little heads in my classroom door making the sign for "I love you".

Have a great school year, my sweet girls.

You're my most favorite 8 & 10 year olds in the whole wide world.  

Oh yeah, and Mattie, you're my favorite 3 year old in the whole wide world, too.  

P.S.  My mom bought them matching friendship necklaces to help Claire make the transition.  

"Best"
"Buds"
"Forever"

Be still my heart.

❤️🏡❤️