Hi there! Cassandra here.
Before I get too chatty, I’ve gotta know who I’m opening up to! Are you also a homestead dreamer? Do you enjoy learning skills to live more self-sufficient even in a small space and with your spare time? Want more delicious & modern canning recipes, compact kitchen gardening, and natural living how-to’s? Don’t miss out on any of that by joining the farm girl family email list:
Welcome to Becoming a Farm Girl, a place where I passionately share ways to start saying YES to your homestead dream and live a farm-fresh life without land or livestock. My blog is here to give you attainable and relatable tips, tutorials, and tools so that you can:
- Become a confident canner and fill your shelves with safe, healthy food.
- Maintain a kitchen garden that will fill your plate from your own deck, patio or small backyard.
- Use simple natural living remedies and skills to live more sustainably.
This whole ‘farm dream’ was NOT planned.
Seriously, tho.
Some farm girls are born into the lifestyle, others are made. I’m the latter, but really, I’ve kinda grafted myself into this wonderful way of living (well, mostly, but more on that in a moment). Never in my wildest dreams would I’ve imagined I would want to identify as a farmer. Heck No! In fact, I was too busy trying to get as far away from my small, sleepy Mid-Atlantic mountain town TO the beltways and a 24 hour anything to chase a cosmopolitan career in the city.
And that, I did.
By the time I was thirty I had three degrees and transitioned from being a teacher to an Assistant Principal at a top-performing school in the state. The only thing I had to do was outsource nearly everything in my life. Was this success? Didn’t feel like it.
Contrary to the stereotype about the generation I belong to, this millennial was raised to have a strong work ethic so I never questioned “the grind” until my health gave me signs I had to make some changes. I had gotten my ”m’s” mixed up. Building a rich legacy isn’t about money, it’s about meaning. I didn’t know it at the time, but recognizing this truth is the very moment I started becoming a farm girl.
I began turning my townhouse into a “homestead in the city”
Yup, in a townhome, an hour or two on weeknights, a bit more on weekends, and in early morning moments, I started digging my hands in the dirt (or dough), and researching all I could at the library, online, and taking courses about the health, environment, economic, and ethical issues I’d always been sympathetic towards but neither committed to nor carved out time aligning my lifestyle around. Information is power, and I was not only convinced but I was also changed.
I was able to say ‘no’ to the prescriptions my doctors recommended, eat cheaper and healthier, demystify food labels, corporate intent, and make my own household, well, almost anything from scratch or natural ingredients.
I’d often chuckled to myself, “Girl, just get yourself a farm!” but then quickly brush it off. Because, well..that would be cruh-ay-zee (and I hadn’t totally lost it). I thought, “I’ll just give myself to let this farm bug bite wear off.“
I got bit by the farm bug. And that bite is something fierce!
But come to find out, farming was in my blood–it just skipped a generation (my parents) and was rarely mentioned until I started sharing my canned jars of jams, soups, and herbal remedies with my folks and I’d hear my dad say, “I haven’t had pear preserve jam in years since mama made these and I forgot how gooood these were …” or “that remedy worked too, but the way your grandmother would do it was…”
I mean what? I lived with these folks for nearly two decades, I phone them religiously every week as an adult and I’m just hearing about this?
What else might those two be hiding from me?!
I had lots to learn about the forgotten, hidden, and honestly downright tragic reasons my own family had abandoned our agricultural heritage.
The short of it is that a perfectly, imperfect storm continued to pour. Luckily, there are rainbows after every storm, and mine revealed a calling back to the land. So with reckless abandon, I started turning my townhome, yes…an 1800 square foot, 3 level, smashed between neighbors on both sides, WITH annoying HOA fees, townhome into a homestead in the city.
Because that’s what you do when have a dream. You don’t sit and wait–you agitate.
Are you becoming a farm girl, too?
Lord willing, my eventual 4-5ish year goal is to have at least 5 acres, source our own eggs, dairy, chicken, keep a cow or two, and a few lambs somewhere in the mid-Atlantic. So, for those of us that don’t live in the middle of the country with a few acres and animals…(yet!) or are currently balancing car commutes and coffee (girl, I mean that literally, like at the same) or are negotiating the gaps of a farm dream and present reality, pull up a chair. We’re both becoming.
And, maybe like me, you’ve recently realized that your family is only a generation or two removed from an agrarian, more self-sufficient legacy, and so, it could be an opportunity for you to truly get back to your roots, too.
Becoming a Farm Girl isn’t just my blog name, it’s the type of friends that I want to meet along the way…gals and pals like you, yes… YOU! Your farm dream is also a journey, why go it alone when you don’t have to? Join me in turning your waiting room into your classroom. To me, this journey is exciting and is a rare opportunity for a second blooming. A chance to build an identity that betters not just my family, but my community, our world, while living with God’s creation, not against it.
You KNOW you’re becoming a farm girl if…
You’re becoming a farm girl if you’re moving in a direction towards wanting to become less dependent on the grocery store by growing and preserving a portion of your own food, eye those “old fashioned” methods with interest, or follow nothing but homesteaders on Youtube (guilty) all while in you’re (fill in the blank: in an apartment, townhouse, city, working a full time, etc.)
Here with me, you will find the support, understanding, skills, and knowledge I’ve learned so far as a homestead dreamer in motion. I’ll share methods to measure and improve your self-reliance goals, doable kitchen and garden projects to scale your micro homestead and the strategy behind how I’m gonna pull this off! While I’m happy to share my successes, I won’t hide my stumblings, either, because, as my dad says, “sometimes you win and sometimes you learn.” This blog focuses on how I’m getting there.
A few fun facts about me…
- I’m a military spouse! My husband is a Navy Chief and right now we’re parents to a four-year-old french bulldog fur baby named Thor (though we hope to add a lil’ humans soon)!
- I grew up taking dance (ballet, jazz, modern) and as a result, I’m always barefoot and boppin’ around my house to a very eclectic playlist-from classical to celtic and mo-town to 80s rock, music sets the mood.
- The places outside of my home that make my heart sing are antique and thrift stores, craft fairs, and the farmer’s market. More recently, I’ve taken up hiking on the weekends and I looooove it.
Thank you for stopping by my humble homestead.
Pour yourself a cup of coffee (or a glass of wine) and stay awhile. I’m here to be your biggest cheerleader along this wild and deeply satisfying journey. The reality is that your farm dream inevitably entails a farm journey. Let connect and become farm girls… together!
I share new videos every single week, documenting how to start your ‘stead here on my blog and on my YouTube Channel. You can also catch me suuuuper casual over on my Instagram page (sans makeup, covered in dog fur, probably mismatched, stuffin’ something in a jar and…very, very, happy).
See you sooon,
Cassandra 😉
Brand new to the Becoming a Farm Girl Blog? Check out some of my most popular content here:
Epic Balsamic and Rosemary Onion Jam
Sweet & Spicy Onion Jam Recipe
How to make (mildly addictive) Carrot Cake Jam
Pretend like the grocery store is your farm!
[BTEN id=”580″]
