~ guest blog post by Bobbi Kleinschmidt

I grew up on a family farm in Milford, Indiana. As a child I didn’t always appreciate weaning pigs, laying irrigation pipe or inhaling dust in a hay mow. I did appreciate that I had a good life and was part of something that made Dad proud. He taught us appreciation for farming and its entwinement with nature. When I left the farm to attend college I realized that agriculture is a unique culture – my culture.

Whenever I’ve interviewed for a job, I mention my farm background and never fail to get a positive comment about our work ethic. Non-farm friends ask for clarification on certain aspects then give thanks for our food. When I meet other farm kids I instantly know who they are because we have the same culture.

When Will and Erin, now seven and five, were born I became a full-time Mom.  At this time, we were living in Van Wert, Ohio surrounded by corn and soybean fields. My husband, Andy, worked as an agricultural extension agent. Farming was outside our back door and a weekend at Dad’s farm was an easy drive. Yet, I felt it was up to me to instill my farming culture into my children.

I recreated my culture to the best of my ability in order for Will and Erin to experience life on a farm. A culture of mud puddles and fresh garden vegetables, of petting bumble bees, pigs and cows, of smelling manure and liking it, of understanding plants and soils and hard work and ethics.  They road tractors, combines and 4-wheelers and took walks to throw stones in the crick. We identified deer tracks and how to tell a hawk from a buzzard by the tips of their wings. Weeds were identified and plucked from the fields. When not at the family farm, we were learning similar things just outside our back door in our country setting. Our Ohio garden fed four families. I could see my culture becoming part of my kids. Then, we moved to the suburbs in March of 2011.

This recent move to the “burbs” of Iowa  has created a new panic within me. What if my children forget the culture I’ve tried so hard to teach them? What if they don’t want my culture anymore?

Again, I felt it was up to me to keep my culture alive in Will and Erin. But guess what? My culture is their culture. Will and Erin asked to help plant the garden; they only willingly eat vegetables that we grow. Will taught his class that the small alfalfa plants they were growing will eventually be fed as hay to cows and even ate a leaf as proof. Erin was helping plant a new tree and identified clay in the soil; she even made a soil ribbon to show me. Both can tell the difference between a hawk and a buzzard in the air and still love a good mud puddle and a walk to their papa’s crick. Both are considerate kids who do their chores. I am so proud!

The burbs are not my favorite place to live, but I am driven to keep agriculture and nature in the soul of my children. We are on a much smaller playing field now and agriculture will always be a part of our lives and is still, in a sense, right out our back door. Farming is still all around us – I just have to look for it a little harder. How are you helping people find farming?

Bobbi Kleinschmidt earned a Bachelor of Science in Agronomy and a Master of Arts in Communication, both from Purdue University. She worked as an agronomist and in public relations and marketing. Bobbi is currently working as a freelance writer while living in the suburbs of Iowa and dreaming of the county while getting dirt under her fingernails.