In a nutshell

So this is the first blog of who knows how many. We will see how this goes and how long it captures my attention.     We are a family of five who live in a small town about an hour from Portland, OR. Although our little town is quaint and cute it is not much more than that. The schools are failing, there isn't too much in the way of local businesses that people bring to the table (although there are a few good ones), and some of the people here are a bit unsavory to say the least. It is not that I hate this place by any means, but it is one of those places that you would look at on your way through and think "this place could be so much more". It certainly has some great attributes, I mean, it lays along a great stretch of river that is quite beautiful. I just wish that the other people here realized what they have. People litter all over in this area that looks like it could otherwise be on a postcard. We take walks down the street and just as I think how peaceful it is I hear some couple fighting and dropping f-bombs loud enough for people blocks away to hear. I wish that I had it in me to go out and put some work into changing this little place but I just think that it is a losing battle at this point.     My family is comprised of my wife Grace, my oldest son Brighten who is 5, my son Sebastian age 3, and my daughter Hope who is 10 months. we have lived here in this little hick town for the past five years. Grace and I have always went against the grain of what most of our peers have strove for, and we still do so today. When most of the people our age strive to bust out of the small town life, we strive to get in. We want nothing more than to get out into the country and live on a couple of acres outside the city of Silverton.       Silverton is a small town that is just terrific and seems like the ideal place to raise our little family, and possibly one day open our pub cafe.  It is a town surrounded by farm land, but it still has enough going on that it would be a good place for a prospective business owner such as ourselves. We hope to have a place that will bring in the tourist that pass through but more importantly the locals. Our dream is to have a place that serves things that are uniquely northwest such as beers from here and simple pub foods that have fresh local flavor. I think that this dream unfortunately is quite a ways off still, but we will see what the future holds.      We hope to be able to get back to a roots style of living to some degree and raise some of our own livestock etc. We don't plan to go off the grid or anything, but it would be nice to get back to basics a bit, and to be able to focus on things that bring families closer together such as working on projects/chores that bring us all closer to a common goal.     Our hobby farming will actually be taking off this next spring before we even have a chance to move (which is still a couple of years off). We are hoping to start out with having a hive or two of honey bees that we can take care of and hopefully be able to eventually make a bit of money off from. We think that the bees would be a good start as they don't require too much attention, and my in-laws have the area to put them for the time being. The bees would be a win/win situation too... we will get our own delicious honey, and the bees would also help to pollinate the fields and gardens in their surrounding areas. I will keep you posted on how the progress comes along with that. Well, for now I guess that it. I don't know how much I will actually post on here, but I hope to keep you up to date on the significant events of the family and our ventures...