Family Farm, August 2023

My last stop on my August travels was my family farm east of Peoria in Central Illinois. As longtime readers know, the cattle barn was destroyed by a tornado in late March. These photos are from late August, but the destroyed barn is now completely cleaned up. I also had a surprise, as the last…

Family Farm, Late June 2023

Update: See the farm in August of 2023 for updates after the tornado. Two days after I posted these photos on March 29 of the family farm, a tornado struck, destroying several structures and trees. Thankfully, the historic horse barn, built in the late 1800s, survived with minimal damage, losing only a few pieces of…

Family Farm, Deer Creek Township, Illinois, March 2023

I woke up to a dusting of snow on the ground, which I was not expecting at this point in the season; apparently the same thing happened in St. Louis. It was very, very cold out, to say the least. But the sky was clear and blue in the morning.

Family Farm, Deer Creek Township, Illinois, June 2022

I took a short trip up to my family’s farm east of Peoria and the crops were just starting to mature out in the fields. I didn’t expect to find these flowers growing so big on the north side of the old ice house. And the tree that is just about dead seems to have…

Clouds Breaking, Family Farm, March 2022, Deer Creek Township

As everyone in St. Louis knows, last week the weather was horrible, and it was elsewhere in the Midwest, but late on Friday the clouds broke and the sun came out, leaving dramatic light and shadow over the prairie at the family farm. As the sun set, pink and purple light shone across the fields…

Hayloft, Horse Barn, July 2021

I climbed up in the hayloft of the horse barn and took some photos. It’s actually much older than the 1901 date that someone painted on the outside. The barn is held together with wooden pegs, not nails, and huge pieces of hardwood.