Arrandale Farms

03/06/2024

I think I finally have appreciating the beauty of roses. 🌹

02/06/2024

There are not many things I am ashamed of when I ponder my time on this planet. However, there is one thing. One thing, that when I sit alone amongst what has become our beautiful farm and a hummingbird appears, I am reminded of. This is a story that is hard and vulnerable for me to share. One filled with the joys of building a new found relationship. One of discovering myself at every trip around the sun. One of setting and destroying boundaries. One of the youthful mind that believed there would always be enough time.

Early on in 2016 Anthony and I bought the land and home that would become Arrandale Farms. There was no one more proud of what we had attained than Anthony’s parents, his mom in particular. She loved the land we had purchased even when I considered it ugly. I was apprehensive to show it off while she wanted the world to know of its un-groomed beauty.

Anthony and I would often be sprung upon with his mom, our mom, just showing up with guests to tour what was back then a field of dirt and unruly trees. I had a difficult time digesting the newness of his mother’s constant appearances and my own emotions. My emotional intelligence at the time was, well, not very intelligent.

After about the first year Anthony and I had come to a place of inflection. Driven by my OCD for wanting everything to be complete and beautiful before anyone ever saw our property, and believing there was always enough time. My heart should have never let my mind believe the latter. It knew better from my time in the death care industry. There is never enough time.

Sitting in Antony’s truck one night in 2017 I snapped and told him that boundaries needed to be set with his mother. I don’t remember the exact wording, but what I did say caused Anthony to cry (one of the very few times I have ever seen him do so). It wasn’t an easy conversation but one I felt adamant about needing to have.

Through the years his mother’s visits had become not only not spontaneous but less and less frequent. If you know Anthony’s mom you know when she loves you she LOVES you and makes sure you not only recognize it but feel it with every fiber of your being. She would constantly praise us for what we have built in our lives. As you get older you realize there are not as many authentic supporters of yourself than you had once thought. Folks come and go from your life because there is some symbiotic relationship between the two of you and really nothing more deep than that.

I didn’t know how to process his mother’s unbound love for us and if I would have just learned to remove the idealistic stick from my butt. I probably would have built more of a friendship like she had with her mother-in-law than a structured mother-in-law/son-in-law relationship. Besides this I always had this underlying feeling that there would always be enough time.

Enough time to garden with her, to sit back and enjoy the beauty of what Anthony and I had built. Enough time to explore the world around us. The truth is there is never enough time. Time is the enemy of perfection. If you are so focused on making everything perfect in your mind you will one day, like me, look up and those you were working so hard to make everything perfect for will no longer be there.

I can’t turn back time and the regret will live within me for as long as I live. After Anthony mother’s medical event a few years ago everything had changed. The time I thought I had to build a bond and relationship with her faded so fast. The time my need for boundaries robbed Anthony of time with his mother. I will forever be ashamed of that.

For all that was, all that is, all that may never be this fountain and hummingbird garden is for her.

31/05/2024

Added concrete planter bowls to the tops of all of the front fence pillars. What do you think?

25/05/2024

Ooooo Lordy the nectarines are coming in strong. We are thinking of opening the farm for a few hours two nights this coming week for a U-Pick. Peaches and Nectarines are ready. What do you all think? Anyone interested? Let us know in the comments.

23/05/2024

We bought about 4 large fountains from a local auction. This is one of them that I feel just fits perfectly in the spot I had in mind for it. Can’t wait to get water in it. 💦 can’t thank Rocky from enough for his help this morning moving all of them!

19/05/2024

Added cup holders to the hammock chairs 😅. I originally bought them as hanging planters but dang they work perfect!

17/05/2024

And just like that our last two litters of baby bunnies are born.

#🏳️‍🌈

14/05/2024

Even after moving to our giant aviary our beloved little lovebird we hand raised flys down to sit on our finer or shoulders.

25/04/2024

Reminiscing of the time when Anthony and I would wash, hand weigh, and candle almost 3000 eggs a week!

12/04/2024

We had a small bridal shower on our orchard patio for a friend. We think the place settings looked amazing!

23/02/2024

New Cacti for our amazing orchard patio.

A STORY ABOUT US- Welome to our page, our names are Chad and Anthony, and we recently bought an urban