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Welcome
to

Four Oaks

Home of Dean and Susan Christ,

Christ Ranch

and gateway to Still Waters.




Four mighty oaks shelter and shade our home site.


Care to sit a spell? We can see the orchard from here and watch the seasons change.

Life on our ranch in the Ozark hills of southwest Missouri moves at a slower pace than in Phoenix, from which we moved. The seasons and the weather now dictate our daily activities.


Autumn announces the onset of apple, persimmon, and pawpaw seasons. The apples are from our orchard,while the persimmons and pawpaws grow wild on our place. Dean and I peel, pare, core, and cut up apples until our fingers ache. But we enjoy the apple pies, apple dumplings, apple crisp, apple butter and applesauce. Dean also makes a mean stack of apple pancakes.

I pick persimmons from the bucket of the tractor while Dean mans the controls, then we spend the whole afternoon milling the pulp for persimmon rolls and bread. The raccoons usually beat us to the pawpaws, but we manage to rescue a few.




One autumn morning, as I gazed out at the woods, I was reminded of the time I sat down with my children's box of Crayolas and made marks with red, orange, red/orange and orange/red to see the subtle differences in those colors.
Looking at the fall leaves, it was easy to distinguish red/orange from orange/red, as well as yellow/orange from orange/yellow. Also scattered through the woods remained various shades of green: kelly, sea, emerald, army and lime; while the dogwoods sported leaves of deep rust, and the maples a brilliant red. tree
Stiff breezes shake the mighty limbs and acorns pummel the roofs of our trailers, making us wonder if the sky could be falling, while the migratory birds flock up, hinting their departure.

One clear night I stepped out on our front porch to investigate a noise and experienced a God-sized hug. The beauty and brilliance of the sky studded with the visible planets, countless stars, and the Milky Way brought tears to my eyes.




Winter finds us enjoying the yellow and purple finch, titmice, bluebirds, nuthatches, chickadees, downy and ladder-backed woodpeckers, juncos, cardinals and noisy blue jays that visit our feeders. A challenging jigsaw puzzle is a favorite pastime on snowy days, as well as building snowmen and taking pictures of all that beautiful white stuff. Thanksgiving and Christmas festivities fill our early winter days. Spring calving begins soon after.




Spring thaw makes Dean's farmer's hands itch to get into the garden soil. Unfortunately, planting the garden is only a fraction of the work. Whipporwills lull us to sleep with their call, while owls hoot softly late night and early morning. Baltimore Orioles and hummingbirds begin to add their color and hum to our feeders, while walkingsticks mate quietly in the orchard.




Summer bounty from the garden includes strawberries, lettuce, radishes, beets, beans, peas, tomatoes, potatoes, cucumbers, melons, and watermelon. June bugs begin flying around blindly in the hot June sun, replaced in the evenings by fireflies. By July, when the wild blackberries ripen, the cicadas have begun their song. Then the katydids add their clickety clack creating a symphony only God could orchestrate.


Hmm. The sun is setting. Care to enjoy it with me?

swing




My Prayer Chair



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birdhouse





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© Susan Christ
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