I was born and raised in a city with no farming experience. I always had the dream of living off the land and surrounding myself with nature. Since I was little, I had a fascination with insects and reptiles, which then grew to wanting to save birds and other animals. When I grew up, I wanted to be a veterinarian and save all the animals, but that didn't happen.
In school, I had a hard time with math. Instead of being offered help, I was told by teachers, to quit classes because I would fail. I fought hard and barely made it to graduate high-school, but I did it. I never saw myself as good enough to go to college, so instead I worked dead-end jobs. I have never been the type to be able to save money or work extra to have more money. I always did my best to make just enough money to pay the bills. I knew what life was like to have nothing, so I cherished what I did have. As a child, I lived in a truck with a camper shell, with my dad and sister for 6 months. We had lost everything. My sister and I helped my dad get through some very tough times which made us all stronger. At the age of 19, I lived in a trailer park on the edge of town in the forest. In my spare time, I would go hiking and enjoyed wildlife photography, rock hounding, and learned about herbal medicine. It always felt so natural to me to be in nature. Even as an adult I still play with bugs, catch reptiles, and help animals in need.
In 2012, I met my husband Brandon Price, who I instantly fell madly in love with. You always see it in fairytale movies and think it doesn't happen in real life. I never believed it would happen to me, but it did. He feels the exact same way about me, and we are still so in love today. We had the exact same idea of living off the land surrounded by nature, though we never thought we would become farmers. It was about 8 months later that I happen to be at the pet store and fell in love with this siamese looking rabbit I saw in one of the cages. I thought it would be a great pet for Brandon, so I brought it home. I thought it was rare and decided to look it up online only to find out it was the Californian breed and they all look that way. I've always been fascinated with the unusual and decided to look up the largest breed of rabbit and found the Flemish Giant. I had to have it! I found one for sale about 2 hours away, so it came home.
We moved a couple months later to the next town over, to another trailer park. We tried to make our space nice but it just didn't feel like home. After talking with my dad, who had recently moved 2 hours away, Brandon and I decided to move closer to him. We thought this would be our chance to finally start our life living off the land. We bought a 700sqft trailer on .13 of an acre. We figured since we already had a couple rabbits that we would start raising more to be our meat source and pelts to make fabrics. In farming, the saying is, there is always that one animal that is the gateway into this lifestyle. Ours was rabbits!
I started looking for more Flemish Giant rabbits to add to our breeding program. I ended up with a pedigreed Flemish Giant buck and that's when I learned about the show world. I had no idea people actually did this. I was talked into showing my pedigreed rabbit. Though I didn't know what I was doing, I went to my first show. It was at that moment I got hooked. Things spiraled out of control and suddenly I had 50 rabbits! It was about 2 years into our rabbit journey that we realized we needed more space and wanted to expand by adding chickens. It took a few months but we were able to upgrade to a 1400sqft home on 1.06 acres in the forest.
Our first job was to build a nice barn for my Show Rabbits to be safe and have enough space. I had learned that Flemish Giants were not a meat breed because their meat to bone ratio was no good and they were slow growers. I then added in Rex rabbits for meat, which ended up being registered and show rabbits. I had learned what purchasing quality animals meant, even if they were meant for food. The care and dedication taken to breed for a quality animal will always exceed your expectations. I worked hard to have some of the top Flemish Giants in the state who won many grand champions. I got to the point of having the rabbits actually paying for at least half of our bills every month. We then setup an area and got about a dozen chickens, which overtime spiraled out of control to 100! We expanded their small run to 1/4 of the property.
On our new property, growing our farm and feeling accomplished, our lives completely changed forever. 5 1/2 years of working on my rabbits ended abruptly and devastatingly. One morning, we awoke to the rabbits thumping on their houses to alert something was wrong. Running outside to find dead rabbits everywhere and a dog inside the barn growling at us. Authorities were called and owners found. But the next morning, we were woken up in the early morning by a bunch of noise. Outside with flashlights, we found the same dog along with another in the barn, and more dead rabbits. Though not their fault, the dogs lost their lives that day, along with all but 3 of my Flemish Giants and a few Rex. One of the Flemish Giants was paralyzed. We didn't sleep for about 6 months, because any noise had us outside with guns and a flashlight. It's amazing to me how much a trauma like that can affect your life. Something you put all your time and effort into, gone in an instant. We tried for a year to buy stock to replace what we had worked so hard for, only to give up and get out of rabbits completely. Nothing compared to all the hard work we put in.
It was at that moment I realized I wanted to add another animal to the farm that would give back more than just one thing. This is when goats were introduced in 2015. I only wanted to get two females and a male. We started with two bottles baby lamancha bucklings. Slowly added two girls when we were ready. We didn't know much and there wasn't a lot of good information out there. We had to learn by trial and error. Our herd started to grow and soon we were at about 20 goats. This is when we started sharing our farm journey on YouTube. We had always seen farmlife as this thriving way of life with no loss. At least that's what was always portrayed online and in everyone's videos. We decided to always share everything, no matter how hard it got, so everyone would know what farmlife is really like. We tried many different breeds of goats to see which one we liked the best for our farm. It was then I realized that we should farm this way about everything. Try as much variety as we could to see what works and what doesn't. In the end, we would know how we wanted our farm to look and run. Slowly adding pigs, trying different breeds. We eventually settled on Kiko Goats, Kune Kune Pigs, and Chickens that layed the most color varieties with the eggs.
Having the same idea in mind, we tried different types of fencing, housing styles, feeders, etc. Brandon and I had decided we knew how we would build our next property because we needed more land. Over 5 years at our location, with all the trials and errors, we took the leap. It took much longer, with a temporary move to our friend's place at Hidden Highlands Homestead. They helped us get out of our 1 acre property so it would sell faster. 5 months later we settled onto vacant land with 36 acres. Everything was drawn out on paper before we did anything to the property, in hopes of keeping our rebuilding at a minimum. It seems there is no end to the amount of trials and errors in farming. Just when you think you have it figured out, something else happens.
It was at this new property we would find more trails than we had ever faced, but also more triumph than we ever imagined. We learned the importance of proper minerals and a quality water source. We learned that sharing our stories would help so many people all over the world. I also learned that I was one that needed to get overwhelmed before I knew what I could comfortably handle. Taking all these things into consideration, we have built a life and a farm we could never see ourselves without. I added rabbits back to the farm, but this time not for show. I started teaching classes on farming to help others get started. Over time, I became known as the, "Go-To Goat Lady". Sharing all our trials and errors, though difficult, seemed to get people's attention. I never expected to end up speaking at events and sharing my knowledge with even more people.
We were starting to build the life we always dreamed of. However, it seemed when things started going good, more trials showed up. We worked hard on this property to make it the best place we could imagine, but with one trial too many, I had enough of the fight. 2 1/2 years on this property, but lack of rain made our dreams of a beautiful green homestead seem so far away. One afternoon, I had finally lost it, and started crying with frustration. This is when our world flipped upside-down. This was the moment our lives took on a whole new journey.
The idea of moving out of the state we were born in never crossed our mind. We never expected what would come next. With a tremendous amount of thought and planning, we moved 1,100 miles away from everything we had ever known. Our friends from Rocking JC's Goat Farm wanted to come with us and homestead together, we were happy to have them join our new adventure. It was the most stressful, agonizing and heart wrenching decision we had ever made. However, what we found was the most breathtaking, fairytale land we ever imagined. Landing on 70 acres of raw land, surrounded by green for miles to see. Rolling grassy hills, natural springs, waterfalls, and peace. As my friend Crystal says, "It's like living in the Hallmark Channel"! We never knew places like this existed in real life.
Starting completely from scratch once again, but this time will be different! Now we have the rain, greenery, trees, and water. All we have to do now is build our home and build our dream farm setup. I'm sure we will still have many more trials and errors because that is what farmlife is. Farming is not for the faint of heart. It's more blood, sweat, and tears than anything else. But thinking of life now, without a farm, seems pointless. We absolutely love this life! We moved to Arkansas with every penny we had to our name. This move was a huge risk but we were willing to take it. We see what the future will bring and how this amazing place will make our farm flourish. Though we are still money poor, we are rich in life. Everything around us will provide what we need to succeed, all we have to do is work hard and believe. Living a farmlife will never make us rich, but it will bring us closer to nature and we can now live off the land.
Comments