Amidst busy summer schedules filled with farm chores, day trips, friend meet ups and family gatherings, while managing heatwaves, heavy lifting, and haymaking (most often compounded), I’ve decided to observe daily moments of “Slow Motion”. That’s what I call the 5 purposeful 10 second pauses inserted into experiences that I’d especially like to remember.

I have kind of a strange obsession with baby maple leaves. There, I said it. It’s out in the open.

The slow emergence, and then the rapid stretching, of the tiny, paper-thin leaves in spring is one of my favorite things ever. In fact, they’re so endearing to me that I can’t help but document their youth in pictures each year.

For me, January is the quiet month. It’s the time when I actually have time. But it takes me a good 2 weeks to get used to the slow in schedule and after the rush of the harvest and holiday season. Between kidding, calving, milking, weaning, moving, hauling, harvesting, processing, and preserving, life on a homestead is pretty darn busy most of the year. But in January, there’s none of that. Say whaaaaaat?