We have been very busy prepping soil, building up beds, planting,
watering, constructing trellises and chicken coop parts, seedlings,
selling at market, and more. So this is our first real blog post now
that things are in the ground and I've been given a rainy day to focus
on indoor things.
The 5 of us that are part of Fantasy Hills have full and part time
jobs, hobbies, events, and busy lives, but we also have a market
garden, crafts, and the never ending project list that is
homesteading. But whats the fun of all of it and the lessons learned
by others through our mistakes and trials if we don't share them with
the world. So its time to get on sharing our world, our trials, our
accomplishments, and our fantasies of a better world.
Right now I sit with our 10 adolescent chickens and a rooster running
around in the yard and a spring salad with radishes, carrots, spring
onions, herbs, mulberries, and last year's dried tomatoes. Soon we
will have bowls and ziplock bags of the blackberries from the thicket
surrounding me. This scene and food give me such a sense of
accomplishment because it took so much to get to this, and we aren't
even "there" really. We rent, we still work "jobs", we have a LONG way
to "go" on the self sufficiency road, but I think we are rounding that
learning curve and have something to show for our efforts over the
last 3 years. No matter where you sit on this learning curve, know
that if we can get here (fast food junkies and tv addicts in our
youth), anyone can.
Sometimes it starts with a trip to the farmers market, a good look at
two eggs, conventional and local free range side by side in a bowl, or
growing your own tomatoes for the first time. (Tomatoes are the
gateway vegetable to growing a whole garden patch all year, I'm sure
of it. Go ahead, try it if you haven't. Trust me you will be hooked.)
Whatever turns you off of fast "food" (I use the term "food" with
caution there - if a substance doesn't decay and bugs don't eat it,
can you really call it food? Sure it may be edible, but we don't
recommend it) and on to making your own food from seed to plate, it's
an important and revolutionary act.
Don't assume I'm holier than thou, though. Just last week I ate at
Burger King and Subway. Life is hectic. Sometimes hunger can really
get to you at a time when you can't cook, and I LOVE me some Chinese
buffet! We all have our weakness, our convenience foods, and our
vices. But there was a time in my life where most of my meals came
from who knows where, with who knows what in it. I recently worked for
a woman that blindly ate three meals a day, five days a week, from
some fast food or restaurant establishment and had the health and
energy level that showed it. It's important to be mindful and take a
moment to nourish our bodies and fully enjoy food again. The most
delicious hobby I've found.
Now, if you're reading this and you're close to us and have or are
buying seedlings and food from our farm, I thank you deeply! And I
welcome you to our world of fun-filled food adventure! I hope you pull
up a seat at our table and stay a while, share your recipes, share
your thoughts and your struggles or achievements in becoming a more
mindful community member and citizen of the Earth. We look forward to
serving you and sharing our skills, ideas, struggles, and abundance
with you all.
If you are reading this from far, hopefully this inspires you to get
to your local farmers' markets, join a CSA, start growing your own
kitchen garden or market garden, or even visit us and sit in a patch
and help me weed, we can gossip with the birds and laugh with the
butterflies a while.
I'm very excited there is a food revolution beginning, and I will be
more excited as I see our public institutions switch to a better diet
that does not cause diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and other
food-related health problems. Food should be medicine, and not
something that hurts us. Feeding food with ingredients we can't
pronounce, made in a plant instead of from a plant, to children,
elderly, prisoners, and college kids alike is a shame. The more people
that change, the more places that change, there will be a tipping
point when we can all appreciate and trust the food on our plates once
more.
Fantasy Hills Farm donates seedlings to community gardens, and this
year we have donated over 20 flats of plants (something like 200
plants or more- I just didn't keep track enough) to Fair Share Urban
Gardens, the Bethlehem Center, and Food Not Bombs. We donate our time
and expertise as well and also volunteer as Master Gardeners in the
Chattanooga area. We can do more in these gardens and all over town
with your help. We will be adding a Paypal button for donations to our
farm that we can distrubute through plants, veggies, and skill share
materials.
I donate time, materials and skills to the community I live in because
in one form or another, volunteering and helping others has been part
of my life since I was a small child. It's just what I do, and it's
been the best way for me to meet people, stretch my skills and help
others at the same time. If you have some spare time or skills, and
want to know how you can make volunteering part of your life, I love
to talk about this. Send me a message or comment.
We currently offer organic, biodynamic, and heirloom seedlings and
plants, veggies, fruits, herbs, flowers, fine art, handcrafts, and
soon eggs. In the future we would like to offer worm compost,
workshops on preservation, a cook book, a pick-your-own farm with a
small CSA and market garden, and more art and value added food
products. We would like to also help install or design kitchen gardens
for group homes, nursing facilities, and addiction centers and help
Fair Share Urban Gardens with urban farming. I am also busy with a
business plan to create a more sustainable farm that pays the farmer a
full time income with benefits.
Our blog will be talking about all of these topics and more. We don't
want to just share food for your body, but I like thoughts to chew on
too, and would like to share thoughts with you, plans, and grow seeds
of inspiration in our hearts. We will be sharing our recipes for food
and inspiration for how to do the things we do. I will always try to
be original, I may have a few select blogs sharing other links, but
mostly this space is about our journey. I will always try and cite
where I find ideas for what I personally try out and what I think, and
how I may change it in the future. I may be wrong on some things, I'm
still learning, and I am always open to constructive criticism. I also
can choose to not allow a comment to be posted based on meanness or
inappropriateness. Of course. I may post something radical and you may
not like it, that's OK. I like to discuss that, you may change my
mind, it happens a lot. But this is my space and I can weed out
inappropriate comments. And I apologize ahead of time for gramatical
errors. In an effort to get this out to the public in a more timely
manner, I might miss some things. My garden has weeds too so in
pictures, please forgive the weeds ;) It's the food that counts. We
will also discuss trap crops and trap weeds soon.
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