Our Historic House is Changing Right Before Our Eyes

It’s April, and at long last we are seeing winter’s firm grip gradually loosening its hold on us! Though ice and snow still occasionally reappear, we keep seeing signs of spring coming to stay! The migratory birds are again visiting our feeders; daffodils and crocuses are popping up, and forsythia are beginning to bud; and the peepers can be heard singing in the evenings!

The slope at the end of the ridge sits in the sun all day long, and its flowers are always the first to make their presence known. I’ve decided to invest in this particular location, adding some other early-blooming species, so that next spring it will break out with even more living color!

I find it amazing that no matter how well you may know a place, there’s always more to explore, more to notice as we grow to know it better. The more I meander around Cozy Ridge, I find myself continually intrigued, making fresh discoveries, and flooded with fresh ideas of ways to transform the place. There are other trees to plant, improvements to make, spaces to fill—an abundance of ways to live into the dreams I’ve been given for this farm!

Of course, it’s not just the landscape at Cozy Ridge that is right now being transformed! Our historic house is also changing right before our eyes, as the old, broken windows are being replaced, giving the stone farmhouse its distinctive look once again! Watching this process take place has provided me with another reminder of the many ways we benefit from our community!

Each of these windows has been handmade by my friend Chris, an Amish carpenter who specializes in making windows the old-fashioned way. These are being installed by yet another friend, whom I refer to as the amazing Anthony, an artisan able to work with nearly every material, and is committed to making sure every job is done right!

I appreciate this very notion of artisanship, of a job well-done, and do my best to bring it to my writing! To me, writing is a calling, much like loving my wife, raising my children, caring for those around me! The things I write are birthed from my very being! And this blessed homestead at Cozy Ridge somehow feeds my very soul, transforming me from within, making such birthing possible!

This Spring, whatever may be going on in your world, may you catch a taste of this new life, this transformation, and in turn know a measure of the joy we experience here on Cozy Ridge!

From our hearts to yours,