For Sarah Sarbacker, home is “where everything starts and ends.” And the modern farmhouse that she and husband Joe share with their three daughters is not just their forever home, but also a way to honor family heritage.
Joe is a third-generation dairy farmer at Fischerdale Holsteins, while Sarah co-owns Cherry Blossom Events, a wedding planning and event design company based in Madison, where she grew up.
Rounding out the “party of five” are ten-year-old Payton, nine-year-old Braelyn and six-year-old Reagan. Sarah shares more about the fun-loving family and their beautiful home, which they built in Verona in 2013.
What brought you to where you live now?
We always knew we wanted to live on the farm. Joe’s bachelor’s degree is in dairy science and he is one of five kids. He always showed interest in owning the farm someday, and we knew we wanted to be close enough to see him when he came in to eat and to be able to jump on for a tractor ride if we needed a “dad” fix.
What do you like most about living here?
What we like most about living on the farm in our modern farmhouse is that both being entrepreneurs who have odd “work hours,” we are able to blend family and work life together to allow to create the maximum family time can have. There are some days that we wonder if that’s the best thing — to have the kids see the stress and challenges of owning your own business.
In the end, we hope it will give our kids perspective and skills to be successful when they get older, whatever they decide to do. We do value being able to work with our kids in things that we do. And we should mention that we like the fact that out of our home window we can see the farm, the cows in the pasture, what we are working towards as our end goal. It keeps the purpose and the motivation in focus.
Your home is stunning! Please tell us about it.
When we built our country home, our forever home, we knew we wanted to have a more modern farmhouse aesthetic to the overall look. Maybe that plays more into the interior styling that we’ve done. When building, we really tried to think through a timeless look — that was important to us. Something that would look like it belongs with the farm and with Joe’s parents’ current farmhouse — since they would all be located in the same footprint — we are all about it looking cohesive and polished. We loved the timeless look of a salt box two-story home and knew that would allow us the freedom down the road to add things to it — such as a front or back porch in later years — but also be the most economical way to build as a young family.
To really emulate a farmhouse look that would feel like it had been here for awhile, we added a cupola on top of the garage, which felt like a way to achieve the farmhouse charm. It later got special meaning when it was topped with a black weathervane purchased by my grandparents, who farm in Sun Prairie. When driving in the back of our field and looking back at our home, we often feel grateful for how it turned out. It’s totally our style as it’s simple yet significant.
What was your approach to the interior?
When thinking about the inside of the house, knowing we were building in the country, we knew the more windows the better — we wanted to see this beautiful view! So we put the tallest windows we could on the first and second floor to not only give us that view but pour in the natural light. Maybe this is why we have always left the walls white in color — we just love the brightness when the sun is out.
Bringing character inside, we used a classic French doors pairing for our dining room. Inside our kitchen, a hand-built table by Joe separates the living room from the kitchen. This table we always say is probably one of the most significant heirlooms we have, as it’s built out of oak boards from a tree off our land. It’s a fond memory for us as a couple too. I believe it went something like, “Hey Joe! I found a link where you can DIY a farmhouse table; looks pretty simple and would probably only take a day.” In our kitchen, a bowling alley lane that serves as the tabletop to our kitchen island has become a conversational piece, which was our hope when thinking through ways to save on building costs.
As our interior style has evolved for our home over the last seven years, we’ve toyed with changing it but somehow it feels nostalgic.
What does home mean to you, and how do you like it to look and feel?
Home is family. It has always meant the people that fill the dwelling to us. For as much as we love creating our home, we know that wherever our “party of five” is will become our home.
Home is where everything starts and ends. It’s where we start each day and so we want to create a space that is inspiring, as well as one that we love to be in together at the end of the day.
What are your favorite things to do together as a family?
We love to have a good time! We try to celebrate the moment no matter how small. Whether it’s a surprise after-school party for our kids, or a themed Oscar dinner night in, we love to create a fun activity to do together as a family.
We are also big about staycations and birthday parties. We have fun creating a themed day in Madison or New Glarus that ends with a stay in a hotel with a pool — and is close enough for Joe to go home and milk! We also love including the girls in planning their birthday parties and creating fun details that they will remember and cherish. Through the years we’ve transformed our house into various themes to celebrate another year around the sun and we’re always excited to see what we can come up with next!
The kids also have a lot of fun together in the barn. Joe is a master of blending hard work with laughter for them. Keeping them interested in the tasks around the farm while using their imagination.
What are your kids most into at these ages?
They’ve really loved being a part of the community theater and their various musicals and plays, getting to try different characters out and practice singing and speaking in front of people. They love playing soccer, basketball, swimming — they really just love to be active. The girls also show cattle at fairs and shows around the state.
And they most of all love to play together around the farm. Whether they’re taking care of their calves or building a straw fort, or just playing in the mud, if we hear the three of their belly laughs together, we know it’s a good time!
There’s never enough time to do everything, so what do you prioritize as a family? What do you always make time for?
As the kids get older, it truly does get harder to do everything, and we definitely know we can’t. Honestly, we try to just take a moment to catch our breath in the thick of a busy season and sometimes that just means turning our phones off and watching a movie together or a family game night.
Why do you choose to live and raise kids in Wisconsin? What do you hope the experience means for your kids?
Both of us growing up in Wisconsin and Joe’s passion to continue his family farm have made it an easy answer to raise our kids in Wisconsin. We also just genuinely love that Wisconsin brings all four seasons to our family’s life. We love the different activities they each bring. And while each season is so different here in Wisconsin, we hope that it teaches the kids to embrace the positive part instead of the negative. If it’s a heavy snow, maybe they’ll chose to make a snowman and play outside, and if it’s ninety-five degrees and hot, go swimming.
What are the most important things to teach your kids?
The most important thing to teach your kids is to listen to themselves. To build confidence in who they are and what they want to do. We think it’s important to give them opportunities to experience things that will make them grow as an individual.
What are you looking forward to doing this summer?
We are looking forward to some great days on the farm with the sun shining and having some delicious meals out in our backyard. We are looking forward to swim days and just lay-around days all together. Maybe most of all being able to let them sleep in!
Photos (from top to bottom, left to right) by Scotify Studios, Sarah Sarbacker, Jenna Kutcher, Jenna Kutcher, Sarah Sarbacker, Sarah Sarbacker, Scotify Studios and Sarah Sarbacker.
Katie Vaughn is the editor and co-founder of Northerly. She is a University of Wisconsin-Madison and Stanford University-trained journalist with experience as a writer, reporter, editor, blogger and author. She lives in Madison with her husband, daughter and son, and is always up for an adventure.