When I bought my farm 8 acre farm many years ago, I thought that was the last place I would ever live. I loved it there. I bought my chickens six weeks before I moved in (visualize: 12 fast-growing hennies roaming around my rental house). Later that summer I bought my first goats and (inadvertently) bred them for kidding the following winter. I grew fruit and veggies for my 18 week CSA season for five years. All the while working full time an hour away and remodeling my 1916 craftsman farmhouse. My days were spent discovering new ways to grow and process food, learning how to be beyond handy, expressing myself creatively, and appreciating the inherent beauty of my “simple life”. It was an exhausting, but extremely rewarding time.
A couple of years ago I got married and had a baby. Then, I had another one. And I started Grad school to change careers. And suddenly there was less time for… everything! There was barely enough energy to make dinner and do laundry, let alone feed, milk, play and with animals, or till and weed gardens. So this summer, we left the Art Farm in Amity and moved to a small, but completely awesome, old house in Independence. The yard is just under 6000 sqft. Gone are the days of eighteen 100-ft garden rows and all the wild blackberries I can snarf. This is a whole different kind of adventure!
Ironically, I now have a little more time to catch my breath and do all my “farm stuff”… but no farm on which to do them. So I’m bringing my farm sensibilities to the city, y’all! There are chickens in the back yard and a clothesline in my kitchen. My basement is full of empty jars and my freezer is full of dead animals. I haven’t baked a pie in months and my stack of torn-from-magazines-recipies is three wobbly piles high. Although that may sound like a country song to many of you, I see it as an opportunity to try out some new things and share the results with anyone else looking to bring a little more farmsiness to their urban lives.
If you have any comments or questions, please don’t hesitate to add them to the blog. I’ll do my best to respond to anyone who takes the time to chime in!
Art Farm Oregon 