Last night, at the dinner table, out of nowhere, Sissy asked if she could have a hatchimal for Christmas.

“What’s a hatchimal?” I asked.

My best friend, who was sitting across the table from me, rolled her eyes. Not because of the hatchimal request, but because of where she knew it came from. Her own son, who is just a month older than Sissy and who goes to the same school, requested an Elf on the Shelf this year, despite not being into the idea at all in years past.

“These schools are ruining our lives,” she said.

Of course it was a sarcastic statement. We love our school, we love our teachers, and we love the staff. But, now that our kids are in school we can’t shelter them as easily from things we don’t really want to support.

But this post isn’t about hatchimals…it’s just the catalyst that got me thinking about what we, as conscientious humans, are constantly trying to reconcile in our brains.

We’re supposed to:

Only buy from small farms
Not support fast fashion
Only eat whole foods
Not buy plastic
Reduce our reliance on fossil fuels
Get rid of our lawns
Grow our own food…

I could go on. But I won’t.

The point is, there’s lots of things we should be doing if we want to carve out a healthy future for our children and our planet. And in no way am I saying we shouldn’t try. At Lost Peacock Creamery we are a small farm, we grow 85% of our own food, we try to buy quality clothes made from quality ingredients, we patch and repair these clothes instead of just getting new, we harvest solar power and use it to power parts of our dairy, and we’re turning our “backyard” into a food garden.

We’re not perfect, though. We buy clothes from Amazon (most recently I got Sis a winter coat and Matthew some thermal running pants), we drive a diesel truck, our kids mostly play with Duplos (most of which were saved by my mother from my own childhood) and Magnatiles, but they recently got a PlayDoh set from Gramma that is rocking their world.

I could stress about these things, but I’m choosing not to. Because I’m still doing SOMETHING.

Repeat after me.

Even if you can’t do everything, you can do something.

Every third trip to the grocery store, get a cheese from a local farm (I highly recommend the cheese with the peacock on it), instead of buying three pairs of cheap pants buy one nice pair of wool pants and get comfortable with the idea of wearing them a few days a week (who says we have to wear a different outfit everyday?), when it’s time to give gifts, support an artisan (Etsy is great for this!), and aim for a few meals a week made completely from whole foods.

We live in a world where we have unrestricted access to information. Sometimes that information is too much. Matthew and I have been going down rabbit hole after rabbit hole where we research the state of the soil, food production, and the effects it has on our planet.

It’s bleak.

It’s been enough to keep us up at night talking about how we can be better and make more of a difference.

And then out of nowhere our daughter asks for a hatchimal…a toy that is most definitely made in China and is most definitely not on any missions to save the planet.

Will she get one? I don’t know. We need to talk more about why she wants one and what she plans to do with it once it “hatches.” Our kids are pretty keyed in to a lot of social issues, on top of being so involved in their food production, and so sometimes I worry that the problems of our adult world are stealing their childhood innocence. Or maybe we’re turning our kids into the kind of human that think about how their decisions affect others, not just themselves. You could probably argue both sides pretty exhaustively.

But then at the end of that argument, what would you be?

Exhausted.

And I think that’s the state of a lot of us right now. Between our jobs, our families, drinking enough water, getting enough sleep, paying our bills…it’s a lot.

Give yourself some grace. We all want to be better, and for many of us, those changes start small. They also tend to have a snowball effect, so that when you’ve gotten comfortable with one change (you know, like buying cheese from a small farm), it becomes easier, and almost natural, to make another change, like buying sustainable clothing. Don’t beat yourself up. Do something, but not necessarily everything.

And if you can absolutely only do one thing this year…plant a tree.

And then send us a picture (hello@lostpeacock.com) because we want to celebrate the addition to our planet with you.

From our family to your family…thanks for being on this journey with us. We are making a difference and it’s only just the beginning.

"Save the World" Fatigue