Homesteaders of America

Well its been a week since the Homesteaders of America conference, so I should probably put my thoughts down before I forget all of them! Life is never boring on our farm, and Kyle’s job throws curveballs at us regularly. So I have to be conscientious about stopping and reflecting before bulldozing onto the next thing…

Our journey there was full of mishaps and adventures. Everything from the wool mill not having our order ready due to a broken hand and machinery not cooperating, to rubbermaid bins flying off our trailer into the shoulder of the interstate, to forgetting that we had to pay tolls on our new route and me pulling some 007 moves worming through luggage and products to get the cashbox at the very very back of the vehicle while Kyle navigated West Virginia Curves. We arrived at the fairgrounds around 9pm after everyone had left, and it was COLD. We still set up as much as we could before traveling another 20 minutes to our Air BNB RV. By the time we lay down it was after 11 and we had to get up at 5 the next morning.

Set up the final touches was interesting the next morning because one of our main products - a Ukrainian designed Cream separator specifically for sheep and goats milk - hadn’t arrived yet. Also dew was EVERYWHERE… and when you are selling handmade soap, dew all over the displayis not really something that is helpful.

The board, staff and volunteers at Homesteaders of America were amazing - they had been in touch our whole travel making sure we were safe and would be able to set up our booth and checking for our delivery of cream separators. Finally at 8:30 we got the word that they had arrived and a tractor was bringing the pallet down the main road. It made me very happy that Joel Salatin was walking down the road and stopped twice to do a double take at the boxes of cream separators. I’ll fan girl over the Farming Superstars all day, but if I can flabbergast someone that is so much more worthwhile to me than getting a photo and autograph!

After the delivery of the cream separators and set up in our display, the even sailed rather smoothly. The staff did a great job distributing the vendors out this year so we weren’t swamped nearly as bad as last year, and the bathroom situation was much more manageable.

(For those of you who don’t know, Homesteaders 2021 had been caught off guard by the amount of people who actually showed up to the event. They had been planning on 3/4 of ticket purchasers to arrive, and instead 100% of ticket purchasers arrived! If you attended that year, there’s an automatic bond with anyone else who attended over the Infamous Bathroom situation, in which there were only 2 porte-potties and one office bathroom for 5,000 people to share. They fixed that the next day, but it was rough that first day! )

I attended my friend Casey Dowell’s workshop on wool sheep and she did a fantastic job as always. For those of you unfamiliar with her work, her website is www.deerlywoven.com and she has gorgeous wool items for sale from her lovely Lincoln Longwool flock. She also has a podcast called ‘Deerly Woven: The Heritage Sheep Journey’ on Apple Podcasts.

During her workshop she mentioned wool sheep could be used for sheep dairy. Folks kept asking her about it so she finally pointed to me and told them to send their questions to me or my booth after her workshop… and boy they did not disappoint! The rest of that day and the next we had people stopping in asking all kinds of wonderful questions about the differences between dairy sheep and other breeds, dairy sheep and dairy goats, and other homesteading questions. It inspired Kyle and I to really get focused about recording our knowledge and experience with dairy sheep into some kind of accessible format for the public. We don’t have any ideas finalized yet, but stay tuned as we work it out!

Kyle was able to attend several workshops and meet cool Homesteading Personalities like Daniel Salatin from Polyface Farms, John Lovell from Warrior Poet Society, and Troy McClung from Red Tool House and the Pastured Pig Podcast. Jess Sowards from Roots and Refuge YouTube channel bought some yarn from me, and Justin Rhodes waved back on the second day when we were tearing down. I also saw Jill Winger and her family walk by, but they were pretty focused on getting to their destination. Anne Ancetta Scott from Farm Girl in the Making bought a cream separator and is even more delightful in person than she is on social media - if that’s even possible. Our booth was next to a lovely lady I now call a good friend - Janet Garmin from TimberCreek farm, who is a well known author on all things small ruminant and yarn in the homesteading community. Then that evening of the first night when we ran to Walmart for some last minute items, Kyle bumped into Shawn and Beth Daugherty and had a lovely conversation with them, and then bumped into the Scott’s on the way out, who remembered him and said hi first.

I still have yet to meet Amy Fewell, who started the whole conference, but she HAS messaged me back on Instagram and follows me… so that’s at least the first step to a long and beautiful 21st century friendship, right?

The thing about all these Homesteader personalities is that, for the most part, they are real people with real farms who are just trying to figure it out like the rest of us. They are humble and kind. Most are fellow Christians. Most WANT you to run up and say hi if you see them at a grocery store, because they are just as isolated and weird in THEIR families as we are. So its not really about their vast impartation of knowledge because they are the EXPERTS. Sometimes they are and do - but for the most part its networking and connecting and sharing valuable insights and experiences. Jess Sowards listened while I told a lady about sheep dairy, as she does cows and has done goats, and even weighed in at one point. Anne Ancetta-Scott and I have a mutual friend in Tennessee and laughed together over how hard our husbands work to keep us in check from overcommitting ourselves (and yet somehow we still find a way to do it when they aren’t looking…) Overall we created much needed community and enjoyed friendship. And when we share a faith, there is a deep fellowship that nourishes the soul.

Before Homesteaders I was feeling burnt out and a bit discouraged. My creative spark was struggling. I still love what we do, but I needed some ‘oomf.’ Homesteaders definitely provides that.

There’s plenty of videos on YouTube and summaries on Instagram on the speakers and vendors of Homesteaders so I’ll let them take the lead on that. The main point I want to get across is: if you are a homesteader and are struggling to find community, GO TO HOMESTEADERS OF AMERICA! Or find a similar conference in your area! Since last year, dozens of similar homesteading conferences have been springing up all over the country. In fact we were invited to a few of them last weekend! So we might be at one closer to you in the future… right now we are looking at the Homesteading Ozarks expo in Missouri and possibly Rory Feek’s Homestead Festival in Tennessee. There is also a Homesteaders of New England conference we are considering but that one is rather close in dates to Homesteaders of America… and while we absolutely love vending at these conferences, we can’t really wear our farm help out or blow ALL of Kyle’s vacation time at these events! So we will see.

If you have any questions about Homesteaders of America, feel free to leave them in the comments section or shoot us an email.