Growing up in the 1990s was a lot of fun. There were no cell phones, few video games, and VHS tapes were a pain. With all that said, I have very fond memories of my childhood. From the time I was born, my family lived in four houses until I was eight years old and once we moved to the farm in 1993, one could call that my “forever” home as it seems to keep calling me back, no matter how many times I’ve tried to move. I live just 30-feet away from it in a remodeled barn, today. The land has been in our family since 1895.

Trent, Tanner, and myself have very fond memories of how often we played outside. We would build forts in the snow, lakes in the dirt, and Trent even built a log cabin (his very first “man cave” on the side of a hill in the pasture. We were raised with our parents owning ostriches and emus, then horses, cattle, chickens, farm cats and dogs. We always had at least two dogs, mostly hunting dogs. Our parents took us deer hunting every year in November. We got out of school for about a week and it was in large part, our yearly family vacation.

Before I was old enough to hunt, I remember playing “house” outside the house of their friend, Mr. Gordon Pinney. I learned what a P.O.W. was from him. He was drafted into World War II and served our country, being captured and taken to a concentration camp. He showed me medals, articles, and photos. When he got released to come back home, he weighed 82 pounds. He is probably the reason I have so much respect and admiration for veterans.

A few of the years we were there, he had a lot of racoons nesting in his hay loft so my mom, dad, uncle, aunt, Trent, and our friend Nate were happy to “take care” of his racoon problem. We were lucky enough to get some photos of them with my mom’s Kodak camera. Of course we had to wait 3-4 weeks to see the photos. Kids today do not understand that kind of delayed gratification.

Growing up without cell phones and video games encouraged us to go outside in the summer and create something. We didn’t get bored. We got busy. We usually played or built until our mom called us in for supper. After supper we would play cards or a board game until she said it was time for bed. We were very creative, innovative, and entertained ourselves without screens. We did have the usual movie night (usually in the winter) and they always involved our mom’s popcorn!