Why stay on a farm?

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Vacation time is the anticipated downtime to engage in activities, see sights, travel places not experienced in day to day home life. Trade city for country, virtual for real. Time on a farm finds the 'kids' in all generations. Let us be your guide: touch, look, listen; hands on, parent and child learning and sharing together.

Our farm is within 3 to 6 hour travel time to dense urban populations in PA. (Phila, Pittsburgh, Allentown) and adjacent states NJ., NY., MD, VA., Washington D.C. Our farm offers a diversity in terrain. Our farm seeds memories, plants understanding and grows appreciation.

Some things to do on the farm and nearby: Sunrise, feed a calf, milk a cow, collect eggs, feel a feather, pet a bunny, groom a pony, hug a lamb, feed a pig, shear a sheep, sow seeds, pull weeds, feel the earth, fish a pond, watch a frog, dip toes in creek, watch a harvest by tractor or team, 'pick your own' berries, apples, pumpkins, try homestead skills: make bread, cheese, ice cream, soap, spinning, felting, canning, seek native /wild plants, watch pollinators at work: bees, butterflies and birds, listen to songbirds, watch eagle, kestrel and hawk soar overhead, sunset, campfire toast mallows by firefly flash under starlight while owls and bullfrogs chorus, step back in time and evening at the Drive-In Movie. Relax, unwind, explore in our part of the 'country'. Make your vacation a "first time I..." memory.

Things to bring: Pack to be outside: closed toe outdoor shoes, socks, outdoor clothes including long pants, hat, sunglasses, lightweight long sleeve shirt or jacket, insect repellent of choice, sunscreen, meds in case of allergies. Bring a book, a puzzle, a board game. Life on the farm is dependent on the weather, but the weather can be independent. We have many size buckets...bring your list and see what fits. We can all be farmers, it's in our jeans.

Our farm has it's own rural signature. Stylized in ponds, creek, natural wetland, native plants and pollinator habitats, paddocks of livestock, acres wooded and canopied with aged hemlock, hickory, chestnut, maple, spruce, locust, walnut, and more, upland pastures with mountain top vistas. Guests houses, beds made and towels hung; your family's home away from home. Themed decor wildside, oceanside, countryside. Equipped for family fun: toys, cribs, highchairs, kitchen ready with appliances, cookware and tableware for your self meal prep.

Our farm has a story, a way to steward our land, a way to enrich, and preserve the PA farm way of life. Look, we are your farmer. Farming for adventure, for understanding, for the quiet side of life. Lose your world and find yourself in ours.

Books and Articles about the benefits of nature and farm living.

Do Unto Animals:: A Friendly Guide to How Animals Live, and How We Can Make Their Lives Better

The more we know about the animals in our world and the better we care for them, the better our lives will be. Former veterinary technician and animal advocate Tracey Stewart understands this better than most—and she’s on a mission to change how we interact with animals.

The Dirt Cure: Growing Healthy Kids with Food Straight from Soil

In the tradition of Michael Pollan, Mark Hyman, and Andrew Weil, pioneering integrative pediatric neurologist Maya Shetreat-Klein, MD, reveals the shocking contents of children’s food, how it’s seriously harming their bodies and brains, and what we can do about it.

VITAMIN N: The Essential Guide to a Nature-Rich Life
 
Vitamin N is a comprehensive and practical guidebook for the whole family and the wider community. Vitamin N reminds us that looking up at the stars or taking a walk in the woods can be as exhilarating as it is essential, at any age.

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The Inner World of Farm Animals: Their Amazing Intellectual, Emotional and Social Capacities

Chickens can count. Pigs are smarter than poodles. Cows form close friendships. Turkeys know one another by their voices, and sheep recognize faces—of other sheep, and of people. Far from lacking thoughts and feelings, barnyard creatures demonstrate sophisticated problem-solving abilities, possess rich social lives, and feel a wide range of emotions.

From Dr. Judith Coche, PhD. Author of Your Best Pathways to Happiness:

* Healthy eating and living: Fresh eggs, fresh cherry pie and homemade apple sauce is every bit as tempting as greasy fast food donuts. Running free hour after hour on the cool, windy hillsides of the farm is every bit as much fun as a shopping mall. The easiest way to teach kids great habits is to place them in a situation where healthy fun abounds.

* Constant learning: From learning that baby pot belly pigs love to mingle with horses 100 times bigger than they are, to learning that farm goats need no fence because they love their farm home, the learning about animals is non-stop fun.

* Responsibility: Unless someone bothers to buy milk, put it in bottles and chase baby lambs around at 4 AM until they can get the nipple in their tiny mouths, the goats will die and the fault will be with the goats’ owners. That lesson could not be more obvious than on a farm.

* Science: What better way to understand the food chain than by collecting fresh eggs for breakfast.

* Beauty: the exquisite elegance of the stately horses is complemented by a long-necked swan swimming on the lake where the girls went fishing. The freshness of morning dew on the grass next to the running water in the pond nearby reminds us of how nature soothes us.

* Love: For young girls who still play with dolls, the natural instincts of mothering kittens creates a long lived memory of just how tender young love can be.

* Hard work and team work pay off: In life we have to work to thrive. And, on a farm, functioning as part of a productive team makes the farm a success.

* Practicality: On a farm, money is hard to come by and even harder to let go. Broken tools can be repaired and re-purposed using ingenuity.