The time is now to return to and reclaim a life filled with joy and fulfillment. A life filled with homegrown produce from the garden, a full larder, meat raised on pasture, and meals made with clean ingredients and love. 

In a world filled with fast food, packed restaurants, and grocery stores stocked with items containing preservatives, food dyes, glyphosates, and antibiotics, it is clear that now is the time to change how you live and what you eat. More importantly, it is time to take the necessary steps to grow, raise, preserve, and prepare food for yourself and those who matter.

Welcome to the homesteading movement, a community of like-minded individuals who embrace traditional living in the modern world. Our chosen life allows us to leave an increasingly busy and loud world and join a humble and rewarding community. Together, we value hard work and the understanding of reaping what one has sown.

On this website, you’ll benefit from our family’s unique perspective and eleven years of experience in homesteading. As self-taught homesteaders, we’ve been fortunate to learn from some of the country’s most seasoned leaders in the homestead movement. This knowledge has given us a deep understanding of the process from seed to garden, garden to pantry, pantry to table, and pasture to plate.

Here, you’ll find a wealth of practical life skills that will change how you view the foods you consume. Learn how to grow a year-round garden, preserve the garden and livestock harvest for year-round eating, raise livestock, bake farmhouse sourdough bread, work with raw milk, and create a profitable homestead regardless of your property size. 

Our homesteading journey is filled with trials, errors, successes, and rewards. As a family, we’ve experienced it all and documented our journey. While our story is not yours, we’re committed to sharing it as a stepping stone to inspire and motivate others on their own homesteading path. 

Friends, your journey begins here.

A traditional life

Families seek to raise barefoot feral children who grab snacks from the garden and climb the tallest apple tree to find the most prominent apple they can reach. These children are chicken wranglers, fence climbers, goat huggers, and some of the best milkmaids around. The kids are covered in dirt, soaked from drinking from the hose, and exhausted by the day’s adventure, as it should be.

The days tend to start before the roosters begin crowing and well before the sun rises. The milk cows are lined up by the pasture gate, waiting for their turn to be milked, as the calves moo incessantly, asking to be released from the calving pens so they can nurse. The hogs have awakened and are impatiently waiting for their morning feed mixed with clabber and slop from the previous day. The barn cats and the livestock guardian dogs wait patiently to be fed, and sheep bleat for their daily grains and hay. The beef cows are the most patient on our homestead. The small herd chews their cud and waits calmly for the next pasture paddock to open, allowing them a new grazing spot. 

Our life never stops, and the chores wait for no one.  The job description includes being present whether we are ill, dealing with adverse temperatures, or working through mud, snow, and ice. The livestock and gardens must be tended to, as that’s the job we signed up for. 

The term “comparison is the thief” of joy runs strong within the homesteading and small family farm communities, as does instant gratification. Homesteaders who live this life resonate and understand what it means to reap what you sow. Your land will reward you repeatedly if you work it well and selectively raise livestock that will thrive on it. 

“Homesteading, at its core, is counter-cultural from our consumerist-driven culture. This is a lifestyle that glorifies salvaging and reclaiming, repairing rather than buying new, and trading and bartering when money is tight.”- author unknown

Whether you are here to glean from articles on my site, attend a hands-on workshop on our farm, take an online course, join our online mentorship course, or find me at a conference, one thing is for sure: you seek to establish a sustainable homestead. A homestead that provides for your family and may one day generate an income. 

Infrastructure on the homestead

Through this site, you will glean tips and tricks you need to know about creating a more sustainable homestead based on the property size. Your journey begins with the bones of the homestead establishing sound infrastructure within the first three years. Infrastructure is essential to achieving your goals and success, regardless of the property size. It sets the tone of the homestead while recovering overgrazed or weed-intensive land. If you diligently work the property, the homestead will work for you within three years. However, be prepared to make modifications in the upcoming years, as goals and plans could very well change.

An intentional garden  

The garden not only provides foods to be fermented and preserved, but its main focus should be growing nutrient-dense foods stored fresh throughout the winter months. Produce that offers vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants that our body requires. Take the time to discover which items store best long-term, how much space is needed, and whether it is best to plant cool-weather crops in the spring or fall garden. For many, a year-round garden is optional. Discover which cold-weather crops do well in winter using a small greenhouse or high tunnel. More importantly, you will discover how much food a family must grow to ensure they reach the next growing season. 

Holding the harvest / Pasture to plate

Over the last eleven years, I have watched many, including ourselves, enter this life. Some are returning to it, whereas others are just beginning their journey. The draw to grow, raise, and consume a clean food source is an enriching journey. Our lives are nonstop, with vacations planned according to the growing and harvesting seasons. Yet, here we live and love it, not seeking to change a thing but always learning how to be more efficient and improve. 

Preserving the harvest allows a family to consume the homestead’s bounty through the next harvesting season. In addition to home canned goods, fermentation, drying, freezing, and a cold storage unit for fresh produce, you can achieve food freedom. In addition to preserving the garden’s bounty, harvesting meat raised on your homestead is an incredible blessing. Learn tips and tricks for raising, processing, and storing clean protein sources such as beef, pork, poultry, and lamb. 

Dairy animals provide a level of food freedom that most do not understand. With the opportunity to create by-products of the main product (milk), a homestead can make butter, yogurt, hard and soft cheese, ghee, buttermilk, and ice cream. Removing the need to purchase pasteurized dairy products from the supermarket. 

Pantry to table

The year’s hard work has been completed. The garden and livestock have been harvested and preserved, and the time to enjoy the bounty has begun. Meal planning is essential to ensure the harvest is fully utilized. 

Grocery shopping from fall through early summer looks quite different for those who have taken the initiative to preserve the foods they consume. Inventorying the food on hand and meal planning is essential to prevent food from going to waste before the next harvest. I understand how challenging meal planning can be, so everyday recipes utilizing foods you have preserved and stored are available for those needing ideas on using the harvest.

Create a profitable homestead

Skillset, confidence, grit, and creativity are the backbone of a successful business, especially when selling wares from the homestead or small family farm. 

A property can generate a profit regardless of its size, though the amount of profit will depend on the size.

  • Smaller-scale homesteads profit well from cottage law opportunities in their state or country. 
  • The homestead on acreage offers a more significant opportunity to generate income through livestock sales, farm shares, CSAs, etc. 
  • Hands-on workshops teaching skills that you have mastered. 

In addition to providing provisions and teaching opportunities from the homestead, there are other incredible opportunities for those willing to share their space with others. 

  • Agrotourism
  • Airbnb rental
  • Working with local homeschooling co-ops

Whichever direction you head, remember that a profitable homestead comes second to sound infrastructure and feeding your family. 

Allow me to help you achieve what you seek

A Farm Girl in the Making encompasses all who want to achieve a more traditional, sustainable, and profitable way of life. Allow me to guide you in this journey, whether through this website, my books, hands-on workshops, online courses I offer, or at conferences across America.