RicelandMeadows

November 27, 2025

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! As we all gather to eat and enjoy the company of family and friends, be sure to give thanks for the many blessings we enjoy.

We are bracing for a Thanksgiving snowstorm. It’s not uncommon for us in the snowbelt of northeastern Ohio, but it always makes a guy shiver! Not to mention questioning if everything has been stored and put away.

Snow on Thanksgiving always makes me think of my grandparents. Grandma would be busy as all get out making the large meal. Family filled the house and conversation was like a din in the small house. The wood furnace kept us all warm and the smells from the kitchen made us all hungry.

It seemed that every year at that time my grandpa had a cow with a newborn calf. I always wanted to go out with him at milking time to see the barn animals and especially the new calf. Occasionally, I was allowed to follow behind my grandpa in the snow and mud on the trek to the barn. I would step in at least one large hoofprint causing water to squirt up to my crotch. I would be a cold muddy mess by the time we made it back to the house.

Looking back on those great memories, I realize now why I was only allowed to go occasionally with grandpa. After preparing a huge meal, feeding a crowd, then washing a mountain of dishes…the next job grandma had was cleaning up a muddy, wet, frozen 8 year-old boy! Man, I miss them!

This is Jaimee and Murtagh. Registered Suffolk Punch draft horses, half brothers, sons of our stallion Hank. They will be my next farm team. They have both been gelded and are becoming fast friends.

I will give thanks today for heartbeats and hoofbeats, the love of family and friends, my memories and for a loving God who makes it all possible.