before we made the call : yes lets do it, lets give it a try. We thought that the hard part was over when the decision was made but that was when the work started. My husband Geert flew on a regular basis to the US to check out farms that where for sale, talk with other Dutch farmers who made the move and meet with people at the MSU extension office to get a better feel about what it would mean to become a dairy farmer in Michigan. In the meantime there was the farm in the Netherlands that had to be dealt with; land that was sold to Geerts brother and cows that went up for auction. Dealing with our oldest daughter who was eight at the time and who did not wanted to move . Also dealing with our son who has special needs and had a hard time understanding all the changes that where about to happen. Trow in our youngest one who would trow tantrums on a daily basis , just because she was in her terrible two's and could. A lot of times I would scratch my head and wonder....And even when we where excited about things to come we where dreading the day we had to say goodbye to our loved ones, relatives and friends.
After a few month my husband heard about this farm that was up for sale in the Thumb of Michigan. A few weeks earlier the State of Michigan , who had an office in Brussels Belgium, send me this book that had all kinds op maps of Michigan in it. One map would show all the highways and another for example all the universities and I told my husband after studying this book that is was not gone live Up North and not in The Thumb because there was nothing else. Well it seemed that this farm in the Thumb had everything we where looking for so a few weeks later my husband , a good friend and myself flew out to Michigan to check out the place. When we landed they told us it was extremely cold in Michigan and we laughed about it. But when we where waiting for the shuttle bus to bring us to the car rental I was already opening my suitcase and putting all the warm clothes I could find and the next morning our first trip was to a local store to buy , gloves, hats and warm boots.
We traveled to the Thumb of Michigan and met with the owner of the farm and ended up making an offer. We saw a lot of farmers struggle with the cold and all the snow. I never saw so much snow in my whole life ! We learned a lot. After ten days I was more then ready to leave the snow and cold and go back to my kids . By then the owner had excepted our offer . Back in the Netherlands, the long process of filing the right paperwork began and the next few months we stayed busy with that till finally we could go to the US Embassy in Amsterdam to pick up our visa . On April 12th 1999 we boarded the plain to fly to Detroit and that became the first day of the rest of our lives.
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