At the Farm with my Dad

Meet my Dad…Ralph Dicke.

I just returned home from family holidays.  The holiday started out at the farm where we celebrated 100 years of the farm.  It was a amazing week-end of stories, pouring over old photographs, and many laughs.

As soon as I drove the gravel roads surrounding the farm a few miles south of Vermilion, Alberta, I realized how much I miss the peaceful place where I grew up.  I’m most definitely a farm girl at heart.  The peace and quiet, wide open spaces, fields of green and yellow, and the haze of dust that hangs in the air after a truck cruises by instantly puts me at peace. It’s an unspoken truth: as soon as you pull off paved roads onto gravel…you always wave at whomever you pass.  How great is that?!

So, now let me tell you a little bit about my father.  He’s a talker.  He has this welcoming spirit and huge smile, and amazing laugh lines as a result.  I used to work at the Vermilion Town Office.  They told me that years ago they took a survey around town: “Do you know who your Town Councillors are?”  My Dad took a great majority of the vote.  He’s never been on Town Council.  He just loves to visit.

 I love that about him.  My son Tyler recently took a trip to the grocery store with Dad. Ty told me it took them an hour to make it down two isles at the store because he knew everyone.  I replied: “Welcome to my childhood”.

So here’s a few pictures that I snapped around the farm that I believe capture my Dad’s amazing spirit.  Love you Dad.

Below: Dad is the second one in.

This picture above reminds me of all the times Dad came in from the field with purple lips from all the berries he ate through out the day…he has his favourite Saskatoon bushes all around the farm.

A few of us 6 girls were in Sheep 4-H.  To this day, Dad attends the yearly Sheep 4-H sale and purchases a sheep.  I don’t think it’s a coincidence he chose this lamb to purchase as the girls are red heads…as are 3 of my sisters.