My Citizen Farmer Adventure: Farmer D + Family Hit the Road
Big changes are happening!
Our family has taken the next step into a nomadic life (at least for now!).
After 6 years rooted down in Encinitas at Coastal Roots Farm, we moved up north to Sonoma County and have been living at Green Valley Farm and Mill for several months, which has been a wonderful experience. Friends, farming, and community. However, work and family were calling us to the East Coast. Once fire season arrived and we knew school wasn’t happening, we decided to uproot and go for an epic cross country adventure in our RV, Daisy.
The decision to leave happened quickly. I was getting ready to travel East to visit many of my agrihood consulting projects through my business, Farmer D Consulting, when I realized I couldn’t leave my family in such a precarious situation next to massive fires. On top of that, our kids were being homeschooled. A blessing in disguise as it gave us the opportunity to make a decision to get on the road, together.
There’s a part of us that longed for an adventure and a taste of the nomadic lifestyle. With fires, bad air quality, floods and earthquakes looming, we felt it would be a good idea to have some backup options to our beloved, yet precarious, California life. It’s a journey to figure out what the next chapter of our life looks like. Some of the questions we are asking ourselves are: Where is our agrihood? What does it mean to be more nomadic? How do we design our life for optimal community and resiliency?
Additionally, we value family above all else and believe this trip will allow us to get closer as a family unit, while also getting some good, old fashioned family time with our relatives. This year is rough but we are trying to look for opportunities to make the best of it.
Our situation is similar to what a lot of people are experiencing right now. Many are asking themselves how they can re-design their life, better educate their children, and make the best out of this changing world (or better yet, this opportunity). This is our first step on our journey.
Better yet, I’ll still able to do my purposeful work of creating agrihoods around the U.S. Over the next few months I’ll be traveling to many of my clients’ farms and agrihoods in Pennslyvania, New Jersey, Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, Mississippi, Texas and beyond. I’ll be sharing my experience of traveling to these farms throughout the next months, so stay tuned for updates on where I am and who I’m with!
If you have recommendations of cool gardens, farms or projects we should visit on our journey, contact me or comment on our Instagram!
I hope my journey inspires other citizen farmers on their quest to live a happy and healthy life. Happy travels to all those on their respective journeys. Share yours with the hashtag #citizenfarmeradventure.