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Our Story
Leipers Creek Farm

One of the reasons for the move from Georgia to the Tennessee farm was because of the unique fit it offered.

While we were at a pivotal point, an opportunity emerged to partner with a family who was interested in their property becoming a working farm, producing healthy food for their family and beyond.

It had a building that could be perfect for a pottery studio, and with 18 years on my small farm in GA,

I had some fitting experience! We were all on the same page about farming "organically",

and most importantly to my teenaged son, it had a pond!

It seemed like Divine provision, and would bring us closer to my daughter and some extended family, but

leaving our GA community and extended family, especially my new granddaughter, would be very hard.

Without feeling the Lord laying out the path for us, the decision would have been impossible,

but trusting His leading, Leiper's Creek Farm is now a growing reality!

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We arrived in early spring, and got to work. Initial tasks were helping finish renovations to the old building, finding a tractor to purchase for bush hogging, and making plans for fencing as I knew that would take some time. We got a chicken house and built an attached pen in April, with plans to free range (but pens are still needed at times, for raising young, etc...).

We ordered 45 heritage breed chicks that would come in May, and built a chick brooder to be ready for their arrival. Scroll through our farm photos below to see much of the journey!

...but May chicks bring November eggs, so we searched for some adult layers that could get us eating "farm fresh" ASAP!

After all, I'd had my own chickens for 18 years, so buying eggs from the store was just unthinkable! Pickins were slim for young adult layers, but we wound up with 20 Buff Orpingtons, 10 Blue Saphires, and a pair of Light Brahmas... the Brahmas are a nostalgic chicken for me, as our very first rooter 18 years ago was a Light Brahma! Good ol' Uncle Jessie, so this one is

 Uncle Jessie II, and wife, Daisy. 

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After 18 years of raising free range chickens, I have come to LOVE livestock guardian dogs. It is ALWAYS hard managing the first year with LGD pups, but Sasha, the last remaining of our GA farm guardians, is 12 now, and feeling her age.

So we're off and running with that tough first year, with Banjo and Barley, our Anatolian LGD pups! I think it's worth a hard year, and those early losses, to reap the benefits of (hopefully) a dozen years with indispensable farm protectors.

Then there was the garden.

It started out lovely in the mild spring weather, but went downhill...it just didn't seem healthy.

The tomato plants were pitiful, and the weeds were plentiful. 

I knew we wanted to garden "organically", which to me largely meant no pesticides, no chemicals, no, no, no... 

but the plants were starving, and the pests thriving.

BUT THEN, In God's good providence, we heard of Kevin Krouse's "Living Soil" workshop, and boy, did it fill in the missing pieces of our farming puzzle! I had come across the term "regenerative farming" recently, and just took it to be a new word for organic farming, maybe with a twist. And to some degree, it is! But Kevin's worship was so in depth and comprehensive, it really set us on a more informed path!

While many might see regenerative farming as working with "nature", as a Creationist, I see how regenerative farming displays God's beautiful and complex design. 

It will take time before we reap results, but we have a clear path! I'm sure I will write more on this as things progress, but in the meantime, check out liberytracefarm.com, or watch the movie "The Biggest Little Farm" for the general concept!

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Farm Photo Gallery

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