A Blast from our Past

What was life like before Pine Needles Quilt & Sew?  I know you're dying to know!  Well, perhaps not, but if you're interested, here are some photos of our life BQS (before quilt shop.)

Here it is...our 600 head dairy farm.  This is where Suzie grew up, and very near where Tom and Marcia did as well.  At the start, when Suzie was just a wee grasshopper, Tom milked just over 30 twice a day in the barn.  This went on for decades, Tom and Marcia farming with Marcia's parents.  They had it all...cows, sheep, pigs, chickens, geese, ducks.  I'm sure there were other things I'm forgetting about, but it truly was an Old McDonald's paradise. 

Flash forward...the go big or go home decision was made.  We expanded the operation, adding the freestall barn, state of the art calf barn (Marcia's dream), milking parlor, and growing lot.  Suzie skips out of most of this work to go to college for what do you know...Dairy Science!  

We very much enjoyed when field trips would come to tour the farm.  

Tom was the Jack of all Trades.  Here is Suzie with baby Carlie (yikes, she's 18 now.). Carlie would cruise the cows with Suzie every day, most of the time falling asleep as soon as she was all bundled up and tucked in.  

Here is Tom mixing feed, which had to be done every single day, rain or shine.

Marcia was the bean counter and in charge of the calves.  This is a picture of her being busted playing a game instead of working.  :)

Marcia designed this calf barn to her exact specifications.

Suzie had an office above the barn where she was responsible for the herd health and reproduction.  

This is brother and son Justin (and Suzie's boys), who was also a huge part of the operation.  We had crops as well as the dairy.

The farming life it is for us!  We don't, of course, regret the decision to change lanes.  The lessons the farm taught us and work ethic it demanded still helps us each and every day with our careers at Pine Needles.  We are also huge fans of being able to enjoy a vacation and locking the shop door at 5:00.  The dairy was truly 24/7/365.  We still have the farming bug a little bit, but we are on a drastically smaller scale.  Suzie and Tom have 9 head of beef cattle, and Tom just returned to work today from 2 weeks of bringing in the crops, helping a friend of his.

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