Best Country Town to Live With a Teenager and Animals? (acres, water)

[Maratila]

Hello!

Thanks for taking your time to read this. Anyways, I am looking for the perfect country area where I can sort of have the best of both worlds. I use to live in a small town in a county in Florida that was mainly agriculture but there was such culture too. It really was a lively town, even though no one knew we even existed. It had good academics and was close enough to big cities that we weren't cut off from the world. I raised my daughter there, but ended up moving out when she was 12 to a city, which does not provide enough room (suburbs) for her animal endeavors. She is now 14, and I really miss having land.


I'm looking for a town that has tons of 4-H clubs and stuff to do for my teenage daughter, who is animal fanatic. She really wants to work with agriculture, like showing it, selling it, etc. However, she also is an academic (home schooled), so we'd like to live somewhat close to a university. Also, we want there to be some type of community so we aren't all alone and isolated.

Thanks for any help.

[ckhthankgod]

This could be a lot of places. Is there anything else that you are looking for?

[AJBarney]

Why not go back to the town you just described?

[StealthRabbit]

Originally Posted by Maratila

..... She is now 14, and I really miss having land.


I'm looking for a town that has tons of 4-H clubs and stuff to do for my teenage daughter, who is animal fanatic. ...we'd like to live somewhat close to a university.[/b] Also, we want there to be some type of community so we aren't all alone and isolated.

Thanks for any help.

Many great places for you. How far do you want to travel?

Personally I would first consider what type of ag holds the most promise for DD. Then find a smaller town / area within 20 minutes of a land grant U. I would also look at college options. Our kids were RURAL home schooled, and were able to go to College instead of HS, compliments of WA state. They each paid and worked their way through university and were done by age 20. And yes, they had to live in the boonies (as well as 5 foreign countries ). Nothing that a lifetime of counseling can't heal

For me it was "Dairy-farm-boarding-school"
; obviously Dr. D did not spend enough time there!

Absolutely no time to be bored or dehumanized. Up at 4:30 AM 7 days / week, and going to school smelling like a liquid manure tank. Be home by 4PM, no after school sports or arts. Sounds normal to me

It prepared me well for becoming a caregiver for a disabled parent the day I turned 18 & for the next 30+ yrs (18 is legal age to become guardian).

You do what you gotta do... (now I have a spouse with chronic illness... maybe in the 'next life' I will be 'enlightened and richly blessed' (I hope I don't have to live in the CITY!... I don't do traffic lights (or street lights). Just give me starlight and moonlight! (snow glistening on the moonlit prairie night)

[SCGranny]

I live in a town with a pop of - 145. All around us are cattle and horse ranches. I own 60 acres and that is considered a "hobby farm".

I work at the local high school. We have a very active 4H and FFA. We also have Drama and Art, and literature, physics, biology, and accounting as well as entrepreneurship. We had 17 seniors graduate last Saturday, and as a group they received over a half million dollars' worth of college scholarships. Many of our seniors also take Distance Learning classes, in French, College English and Comparative Literature, College entry-level Biology, College entry-level Psych, College Calculus, and Computer Technology. Most of our students work their family ranches, deliver and brand cattle, go to school early to practice the latest melodrama or football, basketball, track, and volleyball, stay after school for more practice - and at 5:30 head home to work on the ranch until 9 or so. They are funny, friendly, smart, and no one wears their 'pants on the ground' (can't ride a horse that way). They all have cell phones, iPods, Kindles, all of the latest technology - and because they are so responsible they are allowed to have their cell phones, etc with them (dad might need them to pick up a load of feed or some bull bands at the local feed and seed on the way home). There are no metal detectors. There are no gangs. They travel every year; we have class trips not only for FFA to the State and National Conventions, but to Mexico, France, Spain, and Washington DC. They are well-spoken and compete in speech and all sorts of scholastic events. Many do go into college to become veterinarians, or to take over their Grandpa's cattle ranch and run it for a profit, or to otherwise own their own business. I met one of my graduates the other day at the "Dark Shadows" movie 'in town' - pop 2800 - they go there to bowl or go out to get pizza or subs or Mickey D's on the weekends, or go out even further to catch bass and trout in, or tube and kayak the bountiful streams and rivers, or hunt the huge deer, antelope, and turkey, "for fun". The air is pure, as is the water; the people are blunt and honest and mind their own business - but will stop and help without being asked if they see you in trouble.