(Originally posted Jan 4, 2015)

As the two of you who, might or might not, read this blog Stacia and I bought an old “pig farm”.  I give pig farm quotes because the property has not been used as a pig farm for 30-40 years or for any other kind of farming for that matter.  All that remains from the pig farm was a barn pad, old barbwire fences (throughout the entire 40), a small field and mounds of bones and farm waste.   Even the garden the previous owners were using had been forgotten and let go to rotten fence posts and a sod field. Even if there was no working part of a farm we still feel that we can call the property The Farm.

If you look at the definition of farm it says something along the lines of, a piece of property for the cultivation of crop, animal or both. As Stacia and I both believe that fresh produce and self-sufficiency is something we want to have and a big reason why we moved out here.  And that is why we have tried to move the “farmness” back onto the property.  We have rebuilt and planted the garden, if I can say so we did pretty well for the first year. Lots of good vegetables and hope for more next year.  We built a chicken coop and raised ten loud, quick to run and very well producing chickens. 

So even though “farmness” is not really a word I think that it fits well for what we are trying for. As in Alice in Wonderland, muchness is a term they use for greatness of quality, degree, or extent.   Farmness for me is the pursuit of quality food, degree of resourcefulness, and a great extent of environmental sustainability.  All things that we are shooting for. 

Our farmness is not as good or as full time as some peoples but it is new, strong and we look forward to our new projects next year and years to come. I’m sure we will falter, do things the hard way, or even fail at something all together but I truly hope you enjoy our blog as we try to keep the “farmness” alive here on The Farm. 

• Kit