We are a family of five who believe in simple living, sustaining ourselves as much as possible, and we all share an incredible love for animals.  

We live in a small 1200 square foot home in the hills of the beautiful Columbia River Gorge. We are located on the Oregon side and feel honored and privileged to live in the great Pacific Northwest.

Our family consists of myself (wife and mother), my husband Travis, and our three kids.  Trevor is age 17, Blake 14, and Megan 11.
I have decided to blog our life for two reasons.  One, I love to write! And two, I want to share our experiences with other like minded people who love the same lifestyle.
I would like to start right off by saying that Travis, my wonderful main squeeze, is the mastermind behind this endeavor. He has an incredible determination to see us through even when the chips are down. 
He also has quite a "green thumb", and in fact, I am one lucky lady because his talents do not end there!  He is an extraordinary cook, and an expert at taking some of our grandest visions and making them into our reality. 
He has used simple tools and his bare hands to create a functional farm set-up. After many years of perseverance, we bought this small acreage home seven months ago, right at the end of August.  Since then, Travis has built a run-in shelter for the pasture pets, pasture fences, and buildings for hay storage, just to name a few examples of his handy work. 
He is now starting on a small green house, and more, with the help of our boys.
I am the one who manages our families' activities, the care requirements of our animals, and the every day home duties. 
Two of our three kids have chosen on-line schooling.  It is our middle son who attends public high school. Here is where our families' uniqueness really kicks in because all the while, Travis works at an online gifting company and I am an assistant kindergarten teacher. This takes careful balance and grit. I know you're probably thinking, "Wait, what?"
I would love to answer your questions on how the kids home school while we are working, because believe me I get that a lot! But that will have to be shared in another blog. Right now I feel the need to share how this is not your typical farm.  
I run a small animal rescue/sanctuary as well. My passion is helping animals with sad stories and sharing their journey with others.
Travis and I have been married and raising our family for 18 years, and we have always had one or two dogs, but it was Baby that truly began my animal rescue start in 2010. She is a McNab Collie mix and is now 13 years old. 
Her story before adoption was so harsh that it inspired me to delve a little into volunteering for our local animal shelter. Well people...I was hooked. Line and sinker! I decided then and there that helping animals will be my personal contribution to this life.
Since then, the past several years have been full of fostering more animals than I can list or count (even though I remember them all). Our kids grew up with litters of kittens, pooping puppies, old smelly dogs who could not cope with stressful shelter life, pups who needed socializing, and animals with medical issues to name a few.  
We eventually graduated to goats, and even horses. There were some roosters and chickens in the mix, a few bunnies, and even a few heart wrenching losses along the way.
By 2015, I was a bonified animal rescue queen!  (Truly, ask my family). 
I am so grateful that my husband stuck with me through it all and that my kids are some of the most compassionate people due to this experience growing up.
For a few years, we even rented out our house in town to rent property with land for ourselves to live on, so that we could "try on," so to speak, the farming of animals. This was a great experience and perfect timing because the kids were little and they enjoyed all the outdoor living that an old ranch in Oregon can provide. 
We bought four Nubian Dairy Goats that we learned to milk and we put them to use eating up all the poison oak around the old ranch property.  We also got a fifth goat later on as a rescue. Goats can be quite noisy and naughty at times, haha! 
That obviously never would have worked out if we had them living in our backyard in town. After that experience, we even spent money boarding a horse at a stable, before we sold our house in town and bought our own piece of land. Now, finally, we have our own space to do with what we want, and to continue making our dreams come to fruition.
In this blog, you will see the animals through pictures and hear their stories. You will learn how my husband never gives up and keeps moving us all forward. You may get a taste of how we manage to do it all together and still keep our sanity. We try to make a bit of a difference in a world that seems incredibly divided and chaotic at this time in history.
You will probably hear this a lot, but I feel so humbled and blessed to live in a beautiful place, surrounded by the people I love most, and the ability to live out my passion. I hope you all will enjoy hearing the stories, the good ones and even the sad ones, too. May we all have the chance to love this life together.
 Many Blessings,
 Amy Darr