Hey there! Welcome to Simply Living at Sunray Farms!
I’m so glad that you stopped by today! I hope that you’ll find some things around here to inspire and encourage you to live a simple life. On this site, you’ll find pointers, resources, and plenty of first-hand success stories (and failures) as our family embraces the slow and simple. Are you looking to make small changes that will allow you to slow down and live an intentional life? Then, friend, you’re in the right place!
In our family, and consequently, on the blog, we are focused on simplifying our life, our family, and our homeschool, one small step at a time. If you stick around, you will find posts about our goals to be more mindful of the possessions we have in our home and how we organize them. You might also read about how we are savoring our daughters’ childhoods and embracing our life in the country. And you’ll be able to follow along on our homeschool journey, which is one I never really imagined I’d be on!
I’m not sure I’d call us full-blown minimalists. Still, we are definitely more interested in making intentional purchases that will bless our family and our home.
So how did this change to the simple life come about? Well, let me tell you a little bit about us.
Our Family
I’m Melissa, a thirty-something, former teacher, and recovering perfectionist from NE Oklahoma. I was born and raised in the suburbs, graduated from Oklahoma State University in 2006, and went on to become an elementary school teacher for 8 years. My life was full of clutter, chaos, and trying to please everyone all the time.
My husband, Dillon, is a thirty-something nurse practitioner. He’s also a pretty great woodworker and chef if I do say so myself! He was born and raised in the country on family land that his great-grandfather bought in the ‘50s. He’s the peanut butter to my jelly, for sure!
We have been friends since high school, although I’m 3 years older than he is (yup, apparently I’m a cougar!), but we didn’t start dating until both of us were out of college and working grown-up jobs. We got married in 2012, he moved into my little house in the suburbs, and we worked and ate fast food and tried to stay afloat.
Fast forward to 2015, and our oldest daughter, “Little Miss,” was born. I had resigned from my teaching job the year before, so I am a full-time stay at home mom, which has honestly been my dream since I was a little girl. She is a smart and sassy, yet sensitive kid and so much fun. Her best friend is Riley, the 10-year-old shepherd mix I adopted when she was a puppy. Seriously, they are adorable together!
After a couple of years trying (and failing) to get pregnant and grow our family, we began the adoption process in early 2018. God had different plans, and we found out that we were expecting twin girls in the fall. On Halloween 2018, we welcomed identical twins, Monkey and Cub, to our family. So as you can imagine, things are getting real up in here! Our little family is evolving, and we cannot wait to see what adventures the twin life holds for us!
Our New Adventures
By late 2016 we were trying to grow our family and knew that our little house was going to be far too cramped to do that, so we started looking to buy a new home. We thought we wanted a little bit of land, like maybe 0.5-1 acre. That would be plenty, right? Apparently not. Instead, in the summer of 2017, we started building a house on nearly 20 acres of the land Dillon grew up on, and we moved in at the beginning of 2018.
Our new piece of dirt needed a name, so as a nod to Dillon’s great-grandfather, who started this whole mess, we named it Sunray Farms after the oil company he founded. And that brings us to now. I had no idea how much Dillon missed life in the country, and I had no idea what I’d been missing out on living in town. I mean, have you ever seen the stars out where there are no lights? It’s totally worth the extra driving to get to the store!
As we realized how much the country life suits us, especially our girls, we decided that we wanted to simplify the rest of our life too. We are slowing down, living with intention, and making memories. Trying to keep up with the Joneses and cramming too much into our daily lives will only weigh us down and keep us from living that simple life that we crave.
Somewhere early on in our simplification journey, we also decided that homeschooling our girls sounded like the right choice for our family. We’re taking it year by year and kid by kid. So far, homeschooling is providing us another means to a simpler life that we hadn’t even imagined!
We’re making big changes a little bit at a time, and we hope that you’ll come along for the ride! You can find us on Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook.
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I hope to see you around on the blog! Happy simplifying!