A day in the life of the Hughes family

PITTSVILLE, Wis. — The final morning in October dawned damp and foggy at Alan and Stephanie Hughes’ Sunsett Dairy in central Wood County, near Pittsville. Despite the less-than-ideal weather conditions, the day was jam-packed for the family of five.

The Hugheses milk 50 cows along with their three sons: Bryce, Gavin and Derek. The family raises all of their own replacements, as well as steers they finish out for both selling at market and direct marketing through their on-farm store.

Stephanie is on the farm full time, while Alan works four 10-hour days each week with the Wisconsin Air National Guard at the nearby Hardwood Air-to-Ground Weapons Range in Juneau County.

The morning of Oct. 31, chores started at 5 a.m., well before the late October sun rose. A Friday morning, Alan’s work week was complete, so the couple had planned a day full of errands and appointments in the nearby communities of Abbotsford and Thorp.

“When we plan to make that loop, going to those businesses, we always try to plan a full day,” Stephanie said. “We had planned to leave at 8:30 (a.m.), but someone stopped in to buy beef, so we started out a little behind schedule.”

The Hughes family has farmed at their current location for the past decade, moving to the farm from central Clark County. They ship their milk to Wisconsin Dairy State Cheese Company in Rudolph.

The Hugheses rotationally graze their herd. While the grazing season is nearing the end, their cows are still spending days and nights on pasture, so each milking begins with preparing the barn and bringing cows in from pasture.

“We’re running out of grass, so we aren’t rotating on the same schedule,” Stephanie said. “All summer, they go on new grass every 24 hours. We have about 30 acres that we rotationally graze.”

Once the cows were in and fed, milking began. Alan helps Stephanie get the cows in and start chores each morning before work. Once the cows start staying in the barn, Alan will take on mixing feed before heading off to work. On Fridays and weekends, he works on extra projects and repairs around the farm.

Alan leaves for work at 7 a.m., and shortly after, the three boys catch the school bus at 7:20 a.m., and Stephanie is left to wrap up chores and attend to other jobs around the farm.

“I like to set up the fence a couple of days ahead,” Stephanie said. “That way, (on) days when I need to go somewhere, we have plans or something might go wrong, it’s all done, and putting cows out is a quick job.”

After their trip running errands, Alan and Stephanie returned to the farm to start the afternoon chores early, heading to the barn around 3 p.m. to be finished in time to take their boys into Pittsville to go trick-or-treating.

The school bus drops the Hughes boys off around 3:50 p.m. each day. Then the boys change and head to the barn to do their chores. Bryce usually helps his mom with milking, while Gavin feeds calves milk and Derek handles the calf grain.

Bryce, a sophomore, stayed in town at a friend’s house Halloween afternoon, where he was involved with putting on a haunted maze. Gavin and Derek came home to help with chores and get ready for their night of trick-or-treating.

Once chores were wrapped up everyone got decked out in their costumes. Alan dressed up as a farmer, while Stephanie dressed up as a prize-winning Jersey cow.

Derek, a third-grader, also dressed up as a farmer, complete with a lasso and a cow in his candy bucket.

“I wanted to be a farmer for Halloween because I live on a farm,” Derek said. “I was a cow last year. Next year, maybe I’ll get a blow-up cow costume.”

Gavin, an eighth grader, had a blow-up dinosaur costume for roaming the neighborhoods of Pittsville. He has been busy this fall, working as a stagehand for the school play.

“I like helping to build the sets and making everything work,” Gavin said.

The family, complete with their, dog Pepper, loaded into their truck to head into town for the night. The first stop was the Darr family’s home, where Bryce was helping with the maze.

“His friend’s mom really gets into Halloween, and he’s done this with them for a couple of years,” Stephanie said. “This year, they made it scarier than it’s been in the past. They all went to the haunted maze at Feltz Family Farms in Stevens Point this year; I think that was maybe their inspiration.”

Pittsville is a small community, which makes an evening like Halloween enjoyable, the Hugheses said. They spent two hours visiting friends around town.

“It’s really a very social thing for the whole family,” Stephanie said. “There is one neighborhood that really gets into it; all the houses are decorated, people have fire rings they sit around (and) a lot of them offer apple cider and things for the adults, too.”

That small-town atmosphere allows parents and kids alike to revel in the holiday atmosphere, where the Hugheses say they do not feel as though they have to worry about the safety of their kids on a night like Halloween.

“It’s part of what makes living in a small town such a great thing,” Stephanie said. “The sense of community, the sense of family — you know almost everyone in town, and everyone watches out for each other. Like raising our kids on the farm, raising them in a community like Pittsville is a pretty special thing.”