Hi all! It’s my first blog post, yikes! I thought I would start off by telling everyone about our family farm. We’re a third generation, family farm in Missouri. My great-grandparents, Ches and Emma, started farming this little patch of dirt back in the 1930’s. At the time they were renting the farm and lived in an old log cabin that dates back to the 1800’s (that log cabin has since been relocated to another part of the farm but is still standing and is mostly intact). They officially purchased the property in the mid-40’s and built a farmhouse of their very own. They spent the next few decades farming the land: raising cattle, putting up hay, growing crops, and everything that goes along with it.

Ches and Emma raised seven children, my grandma being one of them, but none of their children chose to keep the farm running. My grandma and her siblings ended up scattered across the country and when it came time to settle Ches and Emma’s estate in the late 1980’s the farm was put up for sale. A landfill company had a lot of interest in purchasing the property but my Mom couldn’t stand the thought of her grandparents’ farm being turned into a landfill. In 1989 my parents made the life-changing decision to purchase my great-grandparents’ farm. They moved me and my brother from St. Louis out to the country, talk about culture shock!

My parents wanted to find a way to make a full-time living with the farm. They started raising cattle and ventured into commercial pork production. Today we still raise cattle and heritage breeds of turkeys (Royal Palms and Blue Slates). We also have a horse, a handful of Nubian goats, a few Muscovy ducks,  and more chickens than we really need. And what farm is complete without a bunch of dogs and cats! 🙂

How does DaisyDoo Homestead fit into this picture? Well, I moved back to the family farm five months ago after spending 20 years away going to college and building my career. I chose a small area on the south side of the farm to build my own little homestead and I named it DaisyDoo Homestead (because I’m a girl and I like to name things 🙂 ). My Dad and I are building my house and outbuildings and we’re incorporating old building methods as much as we can. Lucky for me, my Dad was a carpenter before he became a farmer.

Now I’m carrying on the family tradition of farming and I’m building on what my great-grandparents and parents have created. I’ll share the journey with you if you want to follow along!

Cheers!

D