I made it back safely from Jacksonville last night after a grueling nine hour drive in heavy traffic.  My body is sore, my brain is mush, and my eyes are strained, but my soul is nourished.  I won’t get to see my sons again until June, so I soaked up as much of them as I could.

We had a blast in the little time we had.  On Saturday, we went to Chuck E. Cheese, and it was so packed to the brim they couldn’t really play on any of the rides or games, so we went back again early Sunday morning.  Then, there were only a handful of other families there, and the boys got to play to their heart’s content.  We also spent Saturday afternoon playing in the hotel room, and they seemed to enjoy themselves.  I mostly just watched and soaked up the moments, but I did play with them quite a bit, too.

These weekend trips are brutal physically.  It will take my body a few days to recover, and I’ll be rolling pennies for gas in a couple of weeks, but I know the trips are necessary for the boys and me.  They need to see and feel my presence, and I need to hold and kiss them.  Even though it’s a huge sacrifice in many different ways, I recognize that for their benefit, even these brief trips are important.

Now, it’s time to get back to work.  This will be a busy week at the college since next week is Spring Break.  I’m hoping to get a lot of work done at the farm during that week.  I want to finish clearing the brush from around the building, get the roof and gutter cleared of debris, and get the cinder block wall sealed to prevent water from coming in.  Then, I want to get everything in the building moved into one corner.  If I can at least get to that point, then the rest of the weekends in March, I can work on putting up the insulation and interior walls.  If you haven’t yet done so, please visit our donations page on Indie GoGo and consider making a donation to help us purchase the supplies to renovate the building.  Your support can help us stay on schedule for launching our first growing unit in May.  Thank you very much.