Rising Phoenix Community Farm

Today I'm talking with Heather-Marie and John at Rising Phoenix Community Farm. You can follow on Facebook as well.

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00:00
This is Mary Lewis at A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. 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 Marie and John at Rising Phoenix Community Farm. How are you guys? Good. Thank you. Yep. Great. How are you? I'm good. It's a beautiful day in Minnesota. Yeah. We have snow up here.

00:28
We got a little bit overnight and I didn't know it was going to snow. We got like an inch in Lasur. What'd you guys get? We didn't get any last night, but it was maybe a week ago and we have maybe two winches, something like that. And you're light. Yeah. And you're in Barnum. Is that right? Yes. Half hour south of Duluth. Oh, so you're up in the really pretty country. It is pretty up here.

00:55
Okay, well, tell me about yourselves and what you guys do. Yeah, I started the farm in 2011 and I didn't own land and proceeded over the next 10 years to move five times. And yep, I just leased land and so kind of moved from place to place. Also during that time, I built a tiny house. So it's a little house on wheels.

01:25
and that got moved around so at least I had a place to live. In 2011, I started a very small CSA. It was just me. Then John and I met in 2018. Then in 2020, we bought our farm and have had a permanent place since then. We do flowers and veggies and we have a 56-member CSA.

01:57
Very nice. And I'm so glad you found your permanent farm. Because I sort of do understand when we, back in 2019, I think, the summer of 2019, or summer 2020, a friend of ours said, do you guys want to grow a garden over at my place? Because we didn't have the room. And they had 24 acres and she had a perfect spot for a big old garden, but she didn't want to.

02:25
She didn't want to do a garden, but she knew we did want to. And so we took her up on her offer and that went really well until they decided that they were going to go ahead and get their pole barn built and the contracting company decided that the best place to put the pole barn was right beside where the garden was, which meant it would be shaded out completely the next year.

02:47
And that's part of the reason we actually bought our place in 2020, in August of 2020, because we were like, the only way we're ever going to have a big garden is if we actually move somewhere where we have some land. So I do feel your pain on this. And I'm really excited that you found a place that you don't have to move again from. Yes. Yeah, we are very excited about it as well. Yeah, it's gone. It's gone well. I think we were really lucky. We started looking in early 2020, you know, in the middle of the lockdown and

03:15
We didn't have anything else to do. Looking for land. And, um, this farm was, uh, in the same family for four generations. And, um, uh, one member of that family is still just down the road from us. And, uh, you know, we, we actually got married on our farm the year after we bought it in 2022 and, and members of the, of the Johnson family, who, who, you know, whose family goes back a few generations on this land. We're actually at the wedding. So.

03:44
It's pretty fun to have these connections to the land. And of course they go further back than that. And we can talk more about that if you want it to. I do want to, but I also want to say how sweet is it that you got to get married on your land? That's amazing. Yeah. That was pretty, pretty special and everybody gathered here and, um, yeah, it was, it was pretty great. Awesome. All right. So tell me, tell me more about the land that you bought. Yeah. So it's, it's a 40, it's a 40 acre farm and, uh, it's.

04:14
You know, we were looking for, I guess, you know, everybody's looking for that perfect piece of land, but we like some of its imperfections too. It's on some rolling hills. It's on a busier road than we would like, but that's good for us because we are able to have a rather than go to farmers markets, we sell a lot of our produce on Fridays at a farm stand here on the property. So that's been great. And we've in the process got to know our neighbors. And that's also how we

04:42
kind of opened the door to new customers. And then, yeah, going back further, we're also trying to learn more about the pre-colonial history of this land and the indigenous history of the land. And we've learned some things. We're really lucky that we are just down the road from the Fond du Lac reservation and have actually been able to grow some produce for a CSA program that they have as well. So sort of making those connections slowly has been fun also. Awesome.

05:12
I love it. I'm like a big history buff. I wasn't when I was in school. I hated social studies. I hated history classes because it was just dates and names. But when I started getting into historical fiction and then into historical books that weren't fiction, I was like, oh, this is where all the stories live. Yeah. Yeah. So it's really great when you can find out actual stories of what really happened around you and in your family. Yeah.

05:42
Yeah, that's really important. It is. And I, I kept telling my parents when I would come home from school that I just really didn't like my history classes. And my dad laughed and said, they're not teaching you history stories. They're teaching you facts. He said, wait until you discover some books about history and you start reading about it on your own and educating yourself, you're going to love it. And he was not wrong.

06:11
So history is amazing as long as you can get the actual stories that go with the names and the dates. Yeah, it's true. And we're fortunate, among other things, I'm a journalism professor up at the University of Minnesota Duluth. And so I write an occasional column for our local independently owned newspaper. And the editor there recommended a book to me, and it's called North Country, The Making of Minnesota.

06:41
It's written by, I think, a history professor at St. Cloud State, and I really recommend it to people. It tells the indigenous perspective and the indigenous story in a really strong way. And it's just a really, I started it last winter and I'll pick it up again this winter. It's really, really, I recommend it to anybody learning, interested in that history. I will have to find it. One more thing on history and then we'll get to the other stuff you guys do.

07:09
I live in LaSore. Like I said, we moved to LaSore in 2020 and I knew nothing about this area. We were living in Jordan before that. And there is a history center in St. Peter, which is the town south of us. And apparently we don't live more than 10 miles from where all the Sioux Indians were marched through Minnesota.

07:35
I had read a little bit about that, but I went to this museum and I was like, man, people still suck, but they sucked then too. Because what happened to those Native Americans is just reprehensible and it makes me crazy. And so I went to this museum with my kid who was, I don't know, probably 18, 19 at the time.

08:03
And he was very taken with all the farming stuff that they talked about at the museum. And I'm standing there with tears in my eyes and he's like, what's wrong? And I said, you need to read this thing too. And he read it and he was like, oh man. He said, why do we have to be so sucky as human beings? Yeah. It's, it's, it's remarkable. And this book really does a good job in getting into that history and the complexities of even like the treaties and the money that was involved in those.

08:32
Yeah, there's some unbelievable stories and like you say, unfortunately history classes maybe don't give us all the perspectives. No, they do not. They get whitewashed a lot and that's unfortunate because I think that we should learn from our mistakes in history and a lot of the times we just keep doing the same things over and over again. So that's all I have to say about that because we're gonna go down a rabbit hole that's gonna be way too deep. So did I see...

09:00
Heather, did you make prints as well? Yeah, yeah. I had gone back to school thinking I wanted to teach art and then did not end up teaching. But yeah, I have an art degree. And in the wintertime, I've been trying to kind of dive back into the art world. And so yeah, I do linoleum block prints. And it's the first time we've put them

09:29
on our website this year and so we have them up on the website for sale and I do a little fiber and some jewelry as well. So yeah, it's nice to have the winter time to do some of those things. Use a different part of my brain. Yes. The linoleum, lock prints are super fun. I did that in an art class in high school. Yeah.

09:56
The chisels that we use, I was just so impressed with how that all works. Yeah. And I don't remember what the print was that I did. It was a very long time ago. But our art teacher was fantastic and she was like, so now that you carved out all this stuff, here's how it's going to work. And she's a little ink over it. We're going to lay it flat on a piece of paper and press it. And the pieces that aren't carved out are going to make a design on the paper. And I was like, oh. And

10:24
We had some really talented kids in our class and there were some very nice prints that came out of that. And a few of us traded, you know, we made more copies and we traded and I had three or four of my friends prints framed and hanging in my room because they were so beautiful. Wow. It's a really, I don't want to say it's an easy art form, but it's really fun to do. Yeah, for sure. And it's...

10:52
I've done some other printmaking too where it's called etching, but you have to have an acid bath and there's a little bit more of an up cost. Linoleum printmaking can get very complicated and the prints that people make can be quite big. But it is at least an art medium that you can do at home with not too many parts and

11:21
up costs and stuff. So it is nice to be able to do that at home. Yeah, and there's something really satisfying in the actual carving out the design I found. I thought that was very relaxing. And no lie, I screwed up the first one. I pushed too hard with the chisel tool and ruined it. And I went to my art teacher and I was like, I think I screwed it up. And she said, yep, you did. She said, you got to go easier.

11:50
you know, don't press quite so hard. She said, and here's a brand new piece, start again. She said, you got a good thing going, do it again. And so I wasn't intimidated by it because she was very kind about the fact that everyone makes mistakes when they're doing something new. Yeah, yep, for sure, yeah. I think that's one of the great things about art is that there's some good lessons in there. Yep, patience and everybody makes mistakes and.

12:18
the wonder of it when it comes out right and comes out better than you even thought it was going to be. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep. It can be pretty satisfying. Yeah. Yeah. I wanted to touch on the fact that you do those because my podcast is all about people is also about people who craft. And I was like, Oh, she's gardening and she's a crafter. I got a two for one today. Yeah. Yeah. And I'll brag about Heather Marie a little bit more too. She's really

12:46
taken her art and her design skills and abilities with flowers, both live or fresh cut flowers and doing arrangements there. But then then she dries flowers, I'll let you talk about it. And it's done some amazing stuff with dried flower arrangements and wreaths. And they've her and a woman named Christina who works with us on the farm. I've done some workshops and are planning more things along those along those lines as well. Yeah.

13:15
Yeah, I added flowers. I think I grew some flowers like in the very beginning and then added a few things over time, but it hasn't been since being at this location that I've dove really more into flowers and bouquets and, um, and yeah, I think it sort of uses the same side of my brain as art. And, and, uh, and so it's sort of nice to have that.

13:41
of my brain being used during the summer, otherwise it wouldn't be. And so flowers have sort of allowed me to be artistic and creative while also, you know, kind of expanding our offerings for the farm. Yes. Do you cook too? We do. That's where John excels. John is an amazing cook and a great photographer and great writer. And so, yeah, we both have kind of artistic ways.

14:10
you know, things that we do artistically differently. Yeah, cooking, cooking brings out that same part of my brain that that doing painting or, or, I don't know, crocheting or any kind of art form does. Yeah, yeah, we've had, you know, one of the things we do with our weekly CSA, and I guess just for people who aren't familiar with them, but a CSA is, is it basically a vegetable subscription, right? And you sign up at the beginning of the season for either a full or a half share and you get weekly.

14:39
boxes of produce. And so with that, we put out a newsletter and include lots of different recipes in there. And it's really fun to experiment and we try and encourage our members to share, you know, how they've prepared the vegetables as well. And just to get people excited about eating things they're not completely familiar with and to eat seasonally. And then this this time of year, you know, our CSA is done, but we've got lots of

15:08
our freezers and our walking cooler and our cupboards are filled with produce that we've either pickled or canned or frozen and put up. And so this is the first year we're actually experimenting a little bit with making our own kimchi and sauerkraut and pickles and selling some of those on a really small scales right now, but hoping to expand that side of things as well. But our main goal is to feed ourselves over the winter months. And that's gone well.

15:38
Yes, and I don't want to forget about this, so I'm going to ask now, can people, I don't know how to ask this the right way, if somebody wants to buy a subscription to the CSA for someone as a gift, like for a Christmas present for next summer, can they do that? Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, this time of year is, you know, going into winter is sort of, you know, a time for many farmers where they're not getting any income.

16:06
And so I know other farmers do this as well. And so we are doing it this year as well, where we're sort of offering some things for Christmas gifts for birthday gifts. So block prints, we are we put up our flower subscription for next year. So we have a full share option, and then a punch card option. And so yeah, those those gifts can be can be those shares can be

16:36
for Christmas, for gifts. Awesome, do you let people know that? Because if you don't, you should be. Oh yeah, yep, yep, we actually just launched it. So we sent it out on our, we have a mailing list of not only our CSA members, but other people who have signed up for it, whether it's from our farm stand or elsewhere. And then, yeah, on our social media, we posted it there as well. Good, I can't tell you how thrilled I would have been.

17:05
15, 20 years ago, if somebody had bought me a CSA subscription as a Christmas present, I would have been tickled. Now, not so much because we grow our own garden and we did offer a CSA for a couple of years. And so now probably wouldn't be as impressed with getting a CSA subscription for Christmas because I don't need it. But oh man, 15 years ago, I would love that. And speaking of preserving things.

17:34
I literally just got a black garlic cooker machine thing in the mail today that I ordered because I tried black garlic a couple years back. That was already made and I love it. It's so yummy. And I was talking to a guy who makes it and he was telling me the best way to do it is to actually get a black garlic fermenter slash cooker and just do it that way. So I'm going to be trying my hand at making my own black garlic here in the next two weeks.

18:03
Oh, that sounds fun. Yeah, we grow quite a bit of garlic and sell it raw and then look for other ways to preserve it as well. But we have not gone down the black garlic route yet, but I've heard good things about it. I don't think I've even actually tried it, to be honest. We did. We haven't? It's all like Sydney when we were visiting. But yeah, maybe. Yeah, yeah, that's cool. It's really yummy. It's like candy.

18:28
the way that we had it was in some kind of marinade or something. It was through one of the meal places where you order the ingredients for food and it gets shipped to you and you make the recipe. And I had never heard of black garlic before and I was like, hmm, I don't know about this, you know, and tried it. And it's sort of like garlic, but it's like a

18:56
It's sweet, but it also is garlicky. It's really yummy. Does it, uh, is it shelf stable or how do you preserve it once you make it? Um, in the fridge, it's good for six months in a, in a, in a glass jar with a screw in lid and think it's shelf stable for like a month. If you just have it in a jar with an airtight lid on the counter, I think right about today. So, well, another, uh, um,

19:23
way that we like to preserve garlic is somebody recommended it to us who came to our farmstand. It's a Lebanese garlic sauce. I'm sure I'm saying it wrong, but it's called Tuome. I think it's T-U-O-M-E. It's very simple. It's just you make a paste with kosher salt and the garlic in the food processor. Then you just slowly drizzle in a neutral oil and some

19:53
but just a wonderful way to slather garlic all over everything. Yeah, it's sort of a fluffy cloud of garlic. And that'll keep well too. I've read that keeps four to six months. We don't know because usually when we make it, it's gone in about two weeks. But yeah. I bet it's good on garlic bread. Oh, it'd be great. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. We dipped it with we had that just fresh veggies at Thanksgiving and dipped it in that. Nice. So it's sort of like a garlic hummus idea.

20:21
Sort of. Yeah, it's very strong. Yeah, yeah. The texture is very similar. Okay. Awesome. I might have to try that. Yeah. See, this is part of the reason I love having these conversations with you and everybody else I've talked to because I keep getting all these new ideas to try because homesteaders and farmers are nothing if they're not innovative. Yep. Yeah, that's part of the fun of it all, right? Is trying to learn new things and think about different fun ways to feed yourself and to feed others as well.

20:50
Yes, and I actually love the feeding others more than I love feeding myself. My husband goes to the farmer's market because I have social anxiety, so I don't like being around a lot of people in person. But I'm so excited when he comes home and tells me about all the stories that people tell him about what they're doing with the food that we grow. It's really fun. Yeah, that's one of our favorite things.

21:16
like it is a lot of work. You got to get to put your extrovert hat on for a little while during our Friday farm stands. It can get really crowded and people just love to stop and visit and they'll talk about how they cook something or what they've made. And it feels really good. You know, this is historically a farming community, but a lot of the farms are no longer active. And so people are really excited to see us and other farmers coming into the area and and and you know, rediscovering

21:45
local foods and things like that. So it's really cool to talk about the history of the land and the ways to prepare the different food and all of that is just, I don't know, it's really rewarding. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. We had a guy come screaming into our driveway the first summer we were here. We were outside working in the garden and he pulled into the driveway really fast and he stopped and parked and I was like, who is this? Because we didn't know anybody. And

22:14
He was like, I'm sorry. He said, I was just so excited to see somebody working in the garden. And I said, okay, hi, who are you? And he said, well, he said, I'm so and so, and my dad used to own this place. And my shoulders came down and I went, oh, please tell me about it. And come to find out there used to be an old actual barn, like a barn raised barn, like there was a barn raising to build the barn. Yeah.

22:43
on our property, it's no longer here. And he told us about that. And he said that the last time anything had been grown where our garden was, was 40 years ago. And it was a pumpkin garden. That's all that was grown here. Wow. But you've got some pretty good soil down there, I would guess. We do accept that there's a bunch of clay underneath about, underneath about 12 inches of really good black dirt. It's clay. So this spring when it rained and rained and rained, our garden was soup.

23:12
because there was nowhere for the water to go. Yes. So it was a very rough growing season this summer. We were very happy to see the summer be over and we're keeping everything we've got crossed that next summer is better. Sure, yeah, yep, we hear that. But it's really weird here because we live on a busy road too. And so we have a farm stand and people come in in the summer and buy whatever we have in the farm stand. And...

23:42
That farm stand went up two summers ago. And two summers ago, we had people pulling in the driveway at least 12 to 14 times a day just to see what we had in the farm stand. And we have a dog that is a very good watchdog and she barks at everything that pulls in the driveway. So needless to say, two summers ago, it was very noisy here from mid-June until September. Sure. Do you do a self-service stand? Yes.

24:11
Yeah. Okay. Yep. We do. We limit ours at the moment. We'll see how things have progressed here. But right now we just have it on Fridays in the afternoon. And so we spend, you know, we spend that whole morning harvesting for the farm stand. So it's, but we do hear from people who would like, you know, like to be able to pick up at other times, but some of our you know, some of our regular customers who work out relationships with and

24:39
So if they need something, they know that they can just reach out to us and we'll get an order together for them. Awesome. Do you guys have like a cooler in your farm stand for stuff that needs like the leafy greens and stuff or just you just have stuff out? Yeah, I mean, we have we have a we. We we built a walk-in cooler in our barn and that's I don't know 15 by 8, something like that.

25:08
And so everything gets harvested, washed, packed, and put in there. It kept cool. Oh, sorry. Okay. And then we put things just in coolers to have over at the farm stand, but we have tables and put everything out onto those tables. And so yes, the coolers are over there, but it's not like people are going in and out of the coolers. Okay. We don't have one.

25:35
And so we're trying to figure out the best way to make that happen because the leafy greens are okay for the most part until the end of July and most of August. And then we're like, maybe we don't cut them and put them in the farm stand. Maybe we just wait and see if somebody wants them. We cut them when they come. Sure. Yeah. I know some people have used, have made like a walk-in cooler in a covered trailer.

26:05
and sort of, and then it can kind of be moved closer to the farm stand. My goodness, I'm so sorry. He keeps turning it off and it just keeps coming back on. And then I know some people who have just like bought coolers and have them at their farm stand, kind of like the fancy glass ones, like big refrigerators. I think if we...

26:29
eventually do a second day for our farm stand. We thought about doing like a, like we're here on a Friday, but then it's self-serve on a Saturday. We've thought about getting an actual like refrigerator so that some of those things can just, like you say, it just, they stay cool to a certain point and then they just don't look so great. Yeah. Wilted lettuce is gross looking and you're never going to make it come back to the way it looked when you picked it. It just doesn't work. Yep. Yep. For sure.

27:00
Okay, well, my last question, because we're almost at 30 minutes, and I feel like we didn't really do any talking or anything substantial, but I'm sure that we did. I just, I get sidetracked by things that come up and I'm like, oh, what did I actually wanna ask them? You sound very happy. Are you very happy doing what you're doing? I mean, I guess it depends on when you ask us. If you ask us.

27:25
mid-August when it's hot and everything is taking takeover by weeds. But yeah, I think we do love what we do and yes, it's a ton of work and we don't make a lot of money, but we know that we are providing food for ourselves. We're providing food for our local community with just within a 10-mile radius.

27:50
Um, and then, you know, Duluth is sort of our biggest town nearby and, and we're bringing food into Duluth as well. So knowing that we're feeding people and making people happy and, and contributing to our community, I think is, is pretty great. And we get to play outside. Um, and, uh, and that's pretty great too. So, but it, you know, I think it's easy to romanticize owning a farm and growing vegetables and all of that. And if you just listen to our half hour discussion, it sounds like we're just.

28:19
having a blast and making food, but it's, it's, it's unbelievably hard work, as you know, and, you know, during the summer months, I mean, if the sun's up, we're probably working and as we age, that's going to get harder. But it's, you know, there's a high burnout we have, you know, up here, there's a strong local farming community and CSA members and people who sell at market and things like that, and people who are choosing to live a similar kind of life.

28:48
there's a lot of burnout and a lot of turnover. And I think, you know, it's, it's, if we didn't have off farm income, we wouldn't be able to make it. I think people need to remember that. I think it's, it's incredibly rewarding. And, and, and it's wonderful to, you know, both work hard physically, but also learn so much about the land and the soil and, and all of those things. But it is, it's tough. It's definitely, it's definitely tough. And there's

29:14
days where one of us is having a meltdown, it's never good when we both have a meltdown on the same day. We try and alternate having a meltdown. Absolutely. With the way our summer went, it was so sad and so frustrating. And I had a couple of days back at the end of July when my husband was at work and I was like, maybe we made a mistake.

29:38
Maybe we should have just stayed in the little house in Jordan in town and just had our little backyard garden and called it good because this is really frustrating. Yeah, it's crazy. Like each year, you know, like, like you last year, we had some really heavy rains at the beginning of the season and we had one rain event right after we planted potatoes that just flooded out that entire bed. We pretty much lost 70 to 80% of our potato plantings, which is really big loss for us. Yeah.

30:06
For that, it was a drought, extreme critical drought, whatever the worst name they gave for that situation. And so, and I think that's just sort of the reality. Maybe it's always been the reality of farming, but with climate change and with everything that's happening, you sort of have to be on your toes and expect that every year is gonna be a little different and challenging in a different way. Yes, yes. And part of the reason this summer was so hard is because the first two summers we were here, it was...

30:35
fantastic. We had the most beautiful, lush, producing or productive garden of the whole time we've been gardening, which is like 20 years now off and on. And so we got spoiled. And then the summer it was like, oh, this is the year of the suck. Okay. We have to not expect it to be amazing every year. But I was expecting it to be amazing. So it was really discouraging.

31:04
I took two days to be kind of down about it and really think about it. And I looked around our property and I looked at my gorgeous dog. We would not have a dog if we hadn't moved because she is a barker and she would have barked all the time. And it wouldn't have been fair to her to live where we used to live. So I was like, okay, we have this beautiful three acre place. We have a nice home. We have a great dog and we have the potential for the weather to not be terrible next year.

31:31
I think we made the right decision and I was fine. But you will have days where you will be like, Oh my God, did we make a mistake on this, whatever this thing is? Yeah, for sure. Yep. That's just the reality of farming. Mm hmm. Yep. But in the meantime, when it goes really well, it's really good. It's really fun. It's satisfying. It's exciting. It's, it's a character building at, at worst, really. Yeah.

32:01
So I just want to say that because I don't like ending my podcast episodes on a downer. Yeah, for sure. You know, I think you asked the question, like, do we sound happy? And we are, but I think, you know, like, happiness can be hard, right? Like part of, you know, part of being happy is to have something that's challenging and that you have to push yourself to do and then to fight through those things and realize that, you know, maybe not everybody would choose this lifestyle. It is really rewarding. It really truly is.

32:31
I agree and that's why we're still doing it and it's why you're still doing it. And as a total happy note on the end, I was so excited for you guys that you found a place to be, to not have to move every year because it has to be hard. So congratulations on finding your forever farm. Thank you, you too. All right. Thank you guys for your time. I really appreciate it and you have a great day. Thank you. Yep, you too. Have a good rest of your year. Thanks.

33:01
Take care.