Heather's Homestead

Today I'm talking with Heather at Heather's Homestead.

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00:00
Did you know that muck boots all started with a universal problem? Muck? And did you know that it's their 25th anniversary this year?  Neither did I. But I do know that when you buy boots that don't last, it's really frustrating to have to replace them every couple of months.  So check out muck boots. The link is in the show notes. The very first thing that got hung in my beautiful kitchen when we moved in here four and a half years ago was a calendars.com  Lang calendar.

00:26
because I need something familiar in my new house. My mom loves them. We love them. Go check them out. The link is in the show notes. You're listening to A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters and topics adjacent. I'm your host, Mary Lewis.  A Tiny Homestead podcast is sponsored by Homegrown Collective, a free to use farm to table platform, emphasizing local connections with ability to sell online, buy, sell, trade in local garden groups, and help us grow a new food system.

00:56
You can find them at homegrowncollective.org. If you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe, share it with a friend, or leave a comment. Thank you. Today I'm talking with Heather Richards at Homestead from scratch. Good afternoon, sorry, good afternoon, Heather. How are you? Good, how are you?  I'm good. I have to keep reminding myself of what time it is  because I almost said good morning again, and it's not morning, it's afternoon.  So how's the weather in Montana?

01:23
It's beautiful today. We're supposed to be expecting a lot of rain though this week. So we're trying to get things kind of ready for that and  things buckled up a little bit because it's going to be a rainy week. So  got a batten down the hatches. Yeah. Yeah. It is a beautiful sunny day here in Minnesota, but it's going to be really hot in about an hour and a half.  Nice. Well, I've actually been like waiting for it to get really nice and hot here. So I'm kind of jealous.

01:51
Yeah, it's too hot for Minnesota right now. This is not beginning of May weather. This is end of July, 1st of August weather.  And actually  on,  oh, I can't remember what day it was. A couple days ago, my husband planted the tomato seedlings and  they got burned because it was so hot and sunny. I don't know if they're going to recover. They're still looking a little yellow today. So we're keeping our fingers crossed that they're going to.

02:21
They're going to bounce back, I hope.  All right. So tell me about yourself and what you do at Homestead from scratch. Well, it's Heather's Homestead, technically. But I do say that's my little bit of a, I don't know what you would call it, my tagline, I guess.  But yes, Heather's Homestead.  We just started building this about  four years ago, but we've only been here about three. We're kind of building, I guess, what you could call a family compound. We have five children.

02:51
And most of them are raised. have one at home that he's 18. But the goal is to someday hopefully have everybody want to build here and live here on the property. So we kind of gave each one of our kids a few acres apiece so that they can have. And just so we can kind of just live closer, I guess, as a family. And that's pretty much the goal. we have, like I said, I five children.

03:19
ranging from almost 29 down to 18. Three of them are  married. Yeah, and one of them's about to get married, maybe this summer. That's the plan for him, maybe. So we might have a busy summer. But  yeah, we  are raw milk producers, I guess. We sell  raw milk  and  eggs and have a little bit of, I guess you could call a little mini homestead. We have all the animals.

03:47
Actually, my husband's going to pick up some pigs today. So we'll be adding those to the farm this week. yeah, other than that, that's kind of been a little bit about me, but it's been a fun adventure for us. We started this place from scratch with nothing on it, and we've built everything ourselves. So it's been kind of quite the undertaking, but we've had a really good time and learning as we go.

04:17
So  as we all do, yes, especially when we're not in our twenties and we have all the energy in the world to just dive in  and beat ourselves up. So  you said you sell raw milk. What are the regulations in Montana? And then I will tell you the ones here in Minnesota. So we have to get our animal disease tested once a year and we have to get the milk sent off twice a year to, you know, to a lab to make sure everything is good.

04:47
The  counts are good. so yeah, we are actually pretty  low key here. It's really nice. We don't have too many restrictions, I guess, but  and we can sell from our, from our farms to anyone. We don't, can't sell in stores, but  anyway, gives people the opportunity to come out here and check us out and pick up their milk. So kind of nice.  Yeah. Can raw milk be sold in any grocery store in Montana or is it not allowed?

05:16
Nope, it's farm pickup only. I mean,  I can deliver it to like a draw point, which I do. And  we were doing that this winter, but my cows have slowed down and we kind of just do this honestly to  sell the excess from what we aren't using because we had two cows in milk  and that was a lot. So we would sell the extra. And of course, you know, I  have it for my family and for us  specifically. And so

05:44
If I have it, I sell it. If I don't, I don't. So just kind of one of those things. have a  customer list that pick up regularly here.  So it's someone who  I know who's picking up on what day and how much they get each week.  And it kind of keeps us still. It's not like a random pick up. So  I know who comes to the farm. Yes.  Right there with you.

06:11
I don't like it when people pull in the driveway here and I don't know, I don't recognize the vehicle. Yeah.  I still get twitchy and we've been here five years in August. So. Oh wow.  It's like, who's beat up pickup truck is that? Cause I don't recognize it.  Um, okay. Here in Minnesota, it's only, you can only pick up milk, milk from the farm where the cow produced the milk.

06:38
And it's not allowed to be sold in stores anywhere.  And I think that the, I don't know what the word is,  the owners of the milk cows, let's put it that way, have to be tested a certain amount of times a year, just like you do, I think.  So it sounds like Montana's a lot like Minnesota in the rules.

07:03
I mean, honestly, I mean, I guess you don't want to get me started on what I really think. I think there should be more food sovereignty and people should have the choice and there shouldn't be so much,  you know, dictating on what we choose to consume. But also at the same time, I mean, I get it that people want to have  a peace of mind. But I think  also when you let the government get involved,  you know, it can get tricky.  I think.

07:33
There's a fine line, I guess. So  yeah, what I say is that I come across in the nicest terms possible  is that government has a purpose, but I feel like they end up making us trip over our feet a lot for no reason.  agree. 100%. That's, that's the nicest, easiest way I can say it. Yes.  I agree.  So  what else do you have on your farm besides cows? We have goats. We have,  um,

08:02
horses, horse chickens,  and the pigs are coming. And then obviously we have the cows. And actually this week we are adding some Highland cows.  We picked up a little Highland bull a week or so or two ago, and  we will be picking up some mama cow, a mama cow and her baby this week. That one's kind of exciting. So we decided we want to start  raising the Highland breed.

08:32
We'll see where that goes.  Highland breed is the one that's like really fluffy and sort of burnt orange colored. Yeah, well they can come in different colors, but yes, I mean they have like really shaggy hair over their  eyes. They don't and they're just super, they're a heritage breed and very,  you know, from Scotland is where they originated. And yeah, so we're really excited about that. So,

08:59
not very many people do raise them and so we're kind of excited to start on this adventure  and see how it goes. Yeah, I always see a muppet cow when I think of a Highland cow. Yes, that's good description  for sure.  Okay, do you grow produce too? We do. We have a very large garden.  It produces a lot. In fact, we're still eating carrots and beets.

09:26
and squash from it and onions and garlic from last year. So yeah, it's  quite the garden.  We put a lot of effort into it. I have an orchard of fruit trees and that's something that we actually, when we first moved here or when we first started building, we put the garden in first  and the fruit trees in first because I knew the value of getting those started.  And I'm hoping this year is a good year.

09:54
Last year wasn't a very good year. Sometimes, you know, your fruit trees do well and we had a late frost and Didn't didn't do too. Well, but hopefully this year will be a better year. So we will see Yeah, I'm so jealous of people who live in the southern states because that late frost thing doesn't happen quite as often Yeah, it's it's pretty discouraging. I'll be honest, but it's part of Montana.  We're kind of used to it We get our late we get late frost, know clearing to June and so

10:22
I don't even really plant my garden until  usually Memorial Day weekend. You can put in a few cold hardy things like radishes, lettuce, few things like that, spinach. But I just kind of wait till the very end and then I just kind of put it all in. And so I haven't got mine ready yet. It's still kind of getting cleaned out  because what they say, fall me is not very happy with my spring me or my spring me is not very happy with my fall me, I guess that is.

10:51
because I let it go, but now I got to just get it cleaned up and get it ready to put things in the ground. So yeah, for anyone who isn't living this particular lifestyle, there's a whole lot of planning that goes into doing all the things in the seasons you're doing them in. And it is a lot of planning. Yes, for sure. And I would say too, in the fall you have so much going on with

11:18
Getting things buttoned up and ready for winter and all of the produce, you know, getting  canned and stored and put away. I think I just get a little bit burnt out. So I leave it  and then I regret it in the spring. So I wish it was ready for me to just get into, but  it's not. that's, I kind of do this to myself every year. So we're just kind of attacking it a little by little. Um, you know, when I can get in there for a few hours each day and

11:48
kind of get it ready. hopefully we'll be ready to get it all in at the end of the  month.  I wish you  all the fortunate favor in that.  You sounded so giddy when you were talking about getting pigs and the Scottish Highland cow  here today and then soon.  And I just had like a 45 minute conversation with my daughter this morning. hadn't talked to her in a month.

12:15
And a month ago, it was not really spring here yet. It was still kind of, it was kind of late winter, early spring a month ago, still here. And she says, so what's new on the homestead? Cause she lives in Florida. I said, well, the crab apple tree has bloomed and it's losing its petals as we speak. And we have apple trees that the petals are starting to fall off of. we think that maybe there might be some apples this year and the tulips have bloomed and they're almost done. And.

12:45
We don't have any lilac blooms for some reason, they didn't bloom. And we have fresh asparagus in the fridge from our garden. And she went, you do? I said, oh yes, we're going to have like enough asparagus to sell in the farm stand for the first time this year. And just kept reeling off all the things that I absolutely love about spring since we moved to our place four and a half years ago. And I got done. And she said, it sounds.

13:13
It sounds like you have built such a, a cute, lovely life there.  And I, I  had a little minute of  cute. It's work, you know, but I know, but I know exactly what she's saying because I was talking about everything blooming  and she knows how much I love flowers. So, so I realized how I had come across  and how she was perceiving it.  And I said, is a, a  cute and lovely life.  Yes.

13:44
It's also a lot of work. It is. She said, I know. She said I was just going to follow it up with, you, are you tired? That's pretty much our middle name, I think sometimes. Yeah. There's a lot of, um, a lot to do, but also at the same time, it brings me so much joy. So, you know, you go to bed at night, exhausted, but happy. I think that's a good way to put it.

14:14
Yes lifestyle. We love what we're building. We love what we can produce. We love that we can feed our families  and You know local people and It just feels good  Yeah, the thing I compare it to is when you were a kid  and You went to the lake or the swimming hole or whatever at 10 o'clock in the morning and you spent like four hours screwing around the beach and Swimming and hanging on the dock and sitting on the  beach and talking with friends

14:44
And then you come home,  you get cleaned up, you eat some food, you hit the sack early because your body is tired and your brain is full.  And it's the most wonderful sleep ever.  will say we sleep quite well here. We are definitely, you know, when our heads hit the pillow, we're out. So  it's a good thing.  I wish I could say that my husband's my husband snores. So.

15:12
Well, yeah, mine, I can relate to that.  Uh huh. Yeah. And I shouldn't say that on the podcast, but I've said it before and he knows I've said it, so it's fine.  Okay. So  what brought you to this? Because I don't think that you mentioned that at the beginning. So obviously, you know,  well, raising my family, I always wished I could do this. We lived in a home that we built and we'd lived there for 20 plus years  and raised our children there and

15:42
And I just really wanted it, but you know, we just kind of were comfortable. lived on a little, I don't know, a two acre piece, had a garden, had an orchard, you know, had a few chickens, but it was never, you know, I always dreamed of the milk cow and the goats and the whole, you know, horses. And I just kind of wanted all of that. But it just never was the right time. And honestly, COVID came  and we kind of just felt this nudge that it was time to go.

16:10
and it was time to do it. So it's  quite an interesting story how we found this land.  Obviously we're from Montana. My husband was born and raised here, but we've lived here for 30 years.  Most of 30 years, we had a little stint in Las Vegas for about a year and a half between that time.  anyways,  we just kind of were like, it's time  to find the land and start the you know, the life that we kind of dreamed of and get a little bit more

16:40
you know, reliant on ourselves a little bit.  And we actually decided we were going to move to Idaho. And all of my family is there and we found a piece of property over there and  tried to buy it.  And we had cash in hand to do that and it would not close. And we were just, what is going on? Why is this not closing? It's so simple.  Um, and it was quite a few months and it just, you know, maybe the backup of COVID and all that kind of stuff just

17:11
Anyway,  the day that we were supposed to close on that land, we had friends of ours that kind of lived out here where we live. And we kind of had told them that we were looking for land and they ever knew of anything to come up, you know, let us know. And this is kind of before we had put money down on this land in Idaho.  anyways, he, they called us the day we were supposed to  close on this land and said, our,  our farmer neighbor,

17:41
wants to sell his land  and do you want to meet with him? So we were like, well, what the heck, let's go meet with him.  And we knew immediately that that was, we were supposed to come here and he didn't even have it on the market. And he wrote up his little first sale agreement or whatever, buy sale agreement. And next thing you know, we owned this land and we walked away from the land in Idaho. So it just felt right.  And just,  it was kind of a neat little

18:10
how it all happened,  yeah, next thing you know, we're building on here and starting from scratch, I guess.  so yeah, all my kids said, you know,  when we were wanting to move to Idaho, they weren't gonna move to Idaho. And if, you know, and I had this dream of this little  family, you know,  homestead compound, I guess you could call it.

18:32
And none of them wanted to move to Idaho. And when we, when this came about, everybody was like, we would do it if you're doing it here. So it just kind of worked out really well.  Um, yeah. So that's how we ended up here.  And we just kind of started within like probably a month or so.  And  then I guess the journey began. So yeah, that's kind of how it began, how it started.

18:58
So that's phenomenal. love it. And yes, COVID really  pushed people who were debating about changing their lives to change their lives. Yes. Yes. I think, you know, and I look back on that and I think, you know, at the time I thought it was the worst thing that could ever have happened. mean, I have a very strong opinion on  on what it was really, I guess you could say  that there was more to it than what was really.

19:28
Anyway, I don't know how to get into that, guess, but I was very passionate about getting away from everything and realizing that I don't want to be controlled, I guess. And this was one of those that I knew that if we could build a life, raise our own food, get a little bit away from that system, that we would be fine. And that's kind of what we did. And everything just kind of

19:57
went into place and we just, we got right to it. So it was a, it was a really a blessing in disguise. So I always look at COVID being the worst thing that ever happened, but the best thing that happened as well.  That's how I look at it too, Heather. I really do.  And  we bought our place  in, I think we closed on it the last day of July of 2020  and we moved in,  technically moved in on August 7th.

20:25
Um, we actually were just moving stuff from the house half an hour away to the new house for like a month  in basically an SUV, like a little Ford escape and  a Ford  something. What is it? Escape? Not escape. Um,  I can't think. Focus.  We didn't even rent a van to move stuff. We were just moving boxes in the back of the SUV for a month. And I can remember when we finally got everything here.

20:54
and just crying because I felt so bad that I was so freaking happy  when there was so much sad going on. Yeah. Yeah. I felt that same  way, but new.  I felt like this, like I couldn't have been more at peace that we were making the right decision. You know, like it was time  and you know, I waited, I would say, you know, I dreamed of this my whole life.

21:24
And, you know, just was never something my husband was super on board with. You know, he owns a business, he works hard. And I think that the thought of it was a little bit terrifying to him to  bring on the responsibilities of all the animals and starting over again after we'd, you know, built our first home by ourselves. And it was so much work doing that. And we were finally at a place where we were, we could say we were done.

21:55
Like everything was built, everything was, you know, done. And I think starting over was a little bit, you know, a little bit scary for him. Do we really want to do this? But I think, you know, I mean, obviously no regrets. It's been a lot. I mean, cause my husband is a builder and he does most of it himself. And so running a business and doing all that at once, you know, can be a little bit overwhelming at times as well, but also.

22:24
we have like zero regrets. Like it was the best thing that we ever, ever could have done. I love that you have zero regrets because that's so important when you make this kind of leap.  Um, one of the things I have not actually said on the podcast, when I tell the story of how we got to our place, I keep forgetting this because it doesn't matter anymore.  The house that we lived in was, was rough. Like we did everything we could to make it cute and

22:53
livable and a nice place to visit when people came to visit. But we knew that there were foundation issues starting to happen.  It really needed to be  sheetrocked because it was plaster and lath. And I don't know if you know about plaster and lath, but plaster and lath gets old  and it cracks and it leaves dust everywhere.  And we didn't want to sink money into a house we didn't love anymore.  So that's the other reason that we moved.

23:23
really COVID was the thing that kicked our butts into gear  because we lived in town. Like we were like a block and a half off Main Street  in a town of about 6,000 people.  And it was so hard being surrounded by people, not being able to be with people. Yes. Yes. And I was like, I don't really want to be with people anyway. Can we just finally get out of here? And my husband was like, start looking. Yeah.

23:52
The blessings, so many of them. Yeah. Yup. And I was lucky enough to not lose anybody I love to COVID  and it hurts me that other people did. I hate that part.  And  I actually just came down with diagnosed COVID back in January  and the test came up positive. I was like, you have got to be kidding me now.  Yeah.

24:22
No fun. don't wish it on anybody, but it's a lot less severe now than it used to be apparently.  So yeah, that was a rough four days, four days of misery. And then it took a month to get rid of the cough. Yeah. I kind of, I'm wondering if that maybe made its way through our family as well, but I don't know. We never did any testing and so we never know. But I figured, well, it's not going to do me any good to know. just going to.

24:51
I'd hit it just like I would hit it any other way.  So we kind of never have done it that way, but I'm sure it's hit us, you know, once or twice in these last few years for sure, but we made it.  Yeah. I just, I knew that I was going to be miserable. Whatever bug I picked up  whenever I picked it up because I haven't been sick since December of 2019 until this past January.  Sick with nothing.

25:17
Because I haven't been around anybody because we moved to the middle of nowhere. It's been wonderful. Yeah  So what part of Minnesota are you in? Are you in like close to any big cities like Or are you out way far we are an hour southwest of Minneapolis Okay. All right, and we are half an hour  northeast of Mankato. Okay  Yes, it's

25:44
I could spend six hours telling you how thrilled I am with where I live, but I'm not going to do that because we don't want to spend six hours. What I can tell you is we live in the middle of cornfields. Our lot is completely flat, which is just bizarre to me because we're right up the hill from the river valley. you know how when you're coming into a river valley, you're driving on flat roads and all of a sudden you're going down a hill and there's the river?

26:13
were on that flat part at the top.  And when we moved here, it was a blank slate. The only flowering plant that was here was hostas  and the crabapple tree. now we have a whole bunch of peonies coming up that we put in.  We have apple trees.  have  three peach trees, no, two peach trees,  four plump

26:43
three or four plum trees,  a couple cherry trees, some honey berry plants.  Oh nice.  We have wild black raspberries growing in the tree line. That's nice.  And they think, oh we have a couple elderberry trees that we never get to the berries on because the birds get them before we do.  That's the fun part. Yeah, I'm thinking about getting some of the netting to put over them.  that's good idea.

27:12
See if maybe that would help because I would love to try making some elderberry syrup and I wanted to do it last year and the year before.  And by the time I realized that, I should probably check the berries. They were gone.  Oh darn it.  Yeah. We have every bird known to man on our tree line. I swear to you there. They're all over the place and they really like those berries. They also get drunk on the crab apples that, that get left on the tree.  Oh, feeds them then. Huh?

27:42
Well, that's good. mean, I know there's that part of, you know, the advantage of being out there, but then realizing you have to deal with a little bit of nature that is a little bit challenging. am all for sharing the produce with the animals. It's fine. We lost six peaches to deer last year, which was a bummer. We only had 12. It was the first year they put on peaches. And so we got six and the deer got the other six.

28:11
Here we have a very big, big six foot fence that goes around the whole garden. If I didn't have that, I wouldn't have a garden. We did put that up. actually, like I said, built that first and made sure that I would get little bit of help with  protecting it. And it's been really nice until we make the mistake of leaving the garden fence open.

28:41
Last year we got to, all my chickens got in there, so that wasn't very fun. They destroyed my garden while I was out of town. I had some farm hands that day, that week.  So we were kind of a little bummed about that, but it also was an exhausting year. And so it actually made my life a little bit easier because I didn't have to, you know, can as much.  So yeah, a little bit of another advantage, I guess, to an  unfortunate situation, but.

29:11
It's all good. It's all good. Yeah, last summer was  rough for gardens. It doesn't matter whether your chickens ate your garden or whether it rained too much  or it didn't rain enough. I've  heard so many stories about last summer being really hard on gardeners.  It was. It was. We had things  that always grew, not grow. And it was very, very different than past years.  you know, like I said, we're still eating quite a bit from it.

29:40
The things that really mattered to get us through the whole year,  you know, we they survived so we did okay, but It's it you know, we I have such a large garden that I  probably am one of those that overproduced You know  make too much and then I overwhelm myself at the end of the year When comes to taking care of it, but  I don't there might be some different, you know things we might do this year to make it a little bit easier and I actually might Since I sell milk

30:09
I might have vegetables out there in the milk kitchen and sell more of those and things like that. So we'll see how this summer plays out. Well, let's see how the economy is doing by then too because people might actually need your produce this year. Yes, that's true. So although I saw on the news this morning, the tariff thing is starting to look like they might be dropping them a little lower. So we'll see how that plays out.

30:36
Yeah, that is definitely interesting. I'm kind of just sitting back here and just waiting, right? Just  waiting it out. See how it's going to play out. is the most ridiculous ping pong match I've ever seen in my life. That is true.  So, all right. So, um, I'm going to ask you a question. It's kind of putting you on the spot, but please play the game. Okay. Um, tell me, tell me the one word you would use to describe your homestead.

31:08
tough one, maybe I would say productive.  I think we really do  produce quite a bit and I just am super proud of that.  think that's,  we, know, all the bases are covered here. So,  you know, I think  my daughter is now down to doing bees. And so I feel like, you know, almost everything, you know, is able to be  done here.

31:37
for the most part  to  live.  that's, so I guess maybe that would be my word. I love it. That's great.  All right, Heather, I so appreciate you taking the time to talk with me today. Thank you. Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate that. And  this was really fun. Yeah, it was. Like I said, I don't do very many of these things, so it's kind of nice to be able to chat and tell a little bit about  our story. So thank you for having me.

32:08
Oh, you are so welcome. And I love all of your stories, yours and everybody I've talked to and anybody I'm talking to in the future. So.  Well, thank you. I appreciate it. All right. You have a great day. Thank you so much. Bye bye.