I was sitting at my desk, staring at the Southwest website, realizing that a trip to Pittsburgh for Christmas just wasn’t going to happen. The cost of airline tickets was too expensive to stomach for a family of five, especially this time of year. Kids’ wish lists are funny – the gifts get smaller but more expensive as they get older.
I had spent enough hours researching flights and airlines at this point to know that it just didn’t make sense to fly up north this Christmas. Which was a bummer, even though I really never desire to leave the warmth of Florida to freeze my extremities off in the Pittsburgh winter.
But there’s something about this time of year that calls for just a bit of cold.
I’ll Be Home for Christmas
The holidays are a wonderful time. There’s music, celebrations, decorations….so much to love. But living away from family, this happy time can get tinged with a little bit of sadness. It’s our fault, of course. We are the ones that chose to move away. We love where we live and have no plans to move back to Pittsburgh. But that doesn’t mean we don’t miss spending this time with our loud and large family, sharing in the traditions we’ve grown up with.
The girls, mainly my 10-year-old Scarlett, are saddened by the distance between us and the rest of the family. Scarlett has had the hardest time adjusting. She cries every time we leave from a visit and has said numerous times that she wants to move back. It hurts my heart to hear her say that. I don’t want to make decisions that intentionally hurt my kids, but roots have been established here over the past 5 years.
We can’t go back and none of us really want to…only Scarlett.
Finding a Replacement for Family
When I knew a Pittsburgh Christmas wasn’t going to happen, I had to find a replacement. Because I’m a fixer, it’s what I do.
I clicked off the Southwest site and started searching the internet for “things to do in Tampa for Christmas” in hopes of finding a suitable replacement. I wasn’t sold on any of the ideas I came across. You can only look at Christmas lights so many times before they become unimpressive.
Not satisfied with any events in our area, I stared at my computer screen…. trying to decide what to do. Then I noticed the Airbnb tab in my browser. We had recently started hosting a property of ours up north, so I always have the site open on my computer to communicate with guests.
“Hmmm, maybe I can find something to do on Airbnb?”
Clicking on the Airbnb tab, I noticed for the first time this page:
Sure, I’m flexible. I clicked on the button and was delivered a list of “unique stays” that I could filter and sort through. The only time we’ve ever stayed in an Airbnb was because we needed to be near something else (the beach, Disney, etc). We never stayed in an Airbnb with the thought that the Airbnb itself would be the attraction.
Maybe I was on to something here.
As I sorted through the various tiny homes, shipping containers, and horse ranches, I came across a small organic farm located about an hour away from us. It looked adorable and the reviews were glowing. Plus a one hour drive was totally doable with my one year old boss baby, Evie. Anything over an hour and we are veering towards meltdown status.
I thought, at the very least, we could stay on the farm and venture out to nearby town to enjoy the little shops and small town feel that we all love. There’s something about a brick road that just does something to my brain. I love it. Having the little town nearby definitely eased my decision; I wasn’t sold that my kids would be entertained for 2 days by a farm.
I booked the trip and hoped this adventure would appease my kids’ inner need for travel and distract Scarlett from the fact that we wouldn’t be in Pittsburgh for Christmas.
Nature Calls
The holiday passes and we pack up the fam in our snack-filled minivan (lovingly called Steve) and make the one-hour drive to the farm. Thank sweet baby Jesus for Cocomelon and dehydrated yogurt puffs, both of which helped tame Evie during the ride there.
Pulling up, the girls are immediately smitten with the place. They couldn’t wait to get out of Steve and explore.
“Where can we go, Mom?”
“Can we touch this?”
“Can we pick that?”
“What is this for?”
“Oooooo, this will make a great Instagram picture.” – compliments of my 14-year-old daughter Gianna.
They threw their stuff inside the rustic little 2-bedroom guest house and immediately set out to explore.
Organic Life
It turns out, the farm was all we needed for those 2 days. I planned the trip hoping to buffer the loss of not going to Pittsburgh for Christmas and to give my kids a cool experience. The farm did that, but it also gave me a gift.
Outside in the mild December air, smelling the earth, and watching my girls harvest carrots and peppers from the ground, I realized that time slows down here. It was an organic farm, but not just because of the lack of pesticides. It made us all feel more organic. Back to the earth. Back outside where we belong. Our days were spent outside, getting dirty, petting the deranged deer with a tongue that never quite went back in his mouth. Feeding table scraps to the pet pig and composting the eggshells from the hen eggs we collected.
We were in the sunshine and fresh breeze. We got dirt under our fingernails. We explored the chicken coops and got shit on our shoes instead of being cooped up inside watching shit on the screens.
Technology brought us to this farm, but I saw a life that was in the dirt, living with the earth, pulling, picking, cleaning, digging, feeding…. I never thought that could be a life I wanted. But there’s something elemental and true about getting away from the screens and the internet and just living life – around life. Even if it was just for a little while.
