We’re heading down home… to your farms! Urban, suburban, or rural — whatever you’re growing and doing, we want to see it.
Welcome to the Down Home Farm Tours series. To see all the farms and homesteads featured in this series, click here. If you’d like to be featured, please read here for guidelines.
Welcome, Hills Homestead!
Today, you get to meet Hills Homestead in Australia. On a quest to produce more for themselves, Hayley and her family farm two acres of their own and keep cattle and a dairy cow on nearby land. You can visit her new blog here — blog entries to commence in November (so bookmark it to come back later!).
What is your name and the names of your family members?
I’m Hayley and I’m married to a part-time farmer. We have four beautiful children; Honey, Giggles, Beaver, and Lance. Not their real names but these name definitely portray their characters!
What is the name of your farm/homestead?
Hills Homestead
How long have you been farming/homesteading?
We’ve always had chickens and tried to make our own meals at home but have become more serious about our farm in the past two years.
Share a brief description of your farm/homestead.
We have two acres with rain water tanks, a raised vegetable patch, an herb garden, one bee hive, a washing line out the back plus swings and a cubby house. We also have cattle and a Jersey dairy cow on the neighbors’ property.
What are you raising, growing, and doing?
Much to the amusement of my family and friends, I enjoy ‘fermenting’ and ‘culturing’ foods! I have sourdough starter and kefir on my kitchen counter — they are really good conversation starters!
My farmer husband is the main gardener (and very good at it) and I am learning! He built me a raised garden bed and last summer we harvested tomatoes, snow peas, all the herbs I could ever want in the kitchen, strawberries, beans and corn (we freeze the cobs and it lasted the whole year). We are learning (fast, thanks to YouTube) about beekeeping and LOVE the ‘raw’ honey we have harvested.
How did you get into farming/homesteading?
I’ve always loved making all things ‘homemade’. When I began having children I thought more about what was in foods that we buy. My husband and I chose to ‘produce’ more ourselves and ‘make’ more ourselves so we would know what ingredients are in our meals and snacks. An added benefit is saving money!
Any future plans?
Making blackberry jam in bulk! Then selling in a road side stall.
Any funny stories to share?
As I mentioned, I am only beginning to get into gardening. In the past, I have managed to …. Plant bulbs upside down, kill a rosemary bush (I heard they are very difficult to kill!), and plant a celery stalk thinking it would grow… embarrassing rather than funny!! I’m learning fast!
Is there anything else you would like to share?
My current passion is to share my stories and recipes and ‘real food’ life journey in a blog. I am in the process of setting it up, and would love some visitors on ‘our virtual farm’!
Let’s Tour Hills Homestead!
(Wardee: In the captions below, you’re hearing from Hayley, as she tells what is in each picture.)
Kefir — a great conversation starter!
Sourdough starter on the kitchen counter.
Fresh bread rolls.
My picket fence and vegetable patch getting ready for spring!
Our daughter’s first strawberries.
Tomatoes in the summer.
Lambing season!
Another photo from lambing season — the children just LOVE growing up on a farm.
Raising chickens.
Another chicken photo — the poor things — they get carried around, bounced on the trampoline, and played with continuously! 
There is nothing like fresh eggs!
Our own honey — untreated, unheated, just dripping through the sieve.
(Back to Wardee) Hayley, thank you for sharing with us! We hope you enjoy your free thank you video, our gift to you. Plus, feel free to display the following graphic on your site. (Right-click and save to your computer, then upload to your site and link to this farm tour post.)
Would you like to be featured?
Are you a homesteader or farmer at any level? You don’t have to live in the country, you don’t have to be doing everything.
Being on the journey is the only qualification. We want to see what you’re doing, no matter how big or small.
Click here for submission guidelines for the Down Home Farm Tours series. We’re excited to hear from you!
If you’re selected, we will share your farm/homestead pictures and stories in a dedicated blog post, plus you can add the featured graphic to your blog or website. And, we’ll give you a free thank you video of your choice!
Please give Hayley a warm welcome in the comments! Be sure to visit her brand new blog, too.
...without giving up the foods you love or spending all day in the kitchen!
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LOVED your pictures!!! Are those broiler chicks they are carrying around?
lol I love the image of kids and chickens on the trampoline together! Makes for some lean meat, no doubt! 🙂
Love your pictures!!
Observation: I used to only cover my kefir with a cloth and then learned that it is suppose to be an anaerobic ferment. Since I have started to seal it tight I get much better kefir, nice and bubbly and my grains have been growing like gang busters.
Hayley’s picture has hers covered with a cloth. Wardeh, how do you cover yours?
I totally agree. We have extra grains to give our chickens now every day now that we ferment them with a Pickl-It. It’s delicious too.
Hayley,
My four children carry our chickens everywhere they go. They used to take them for a ride on the swing and let the chickens “fly” when they reached the peak. And you know, they chickens came back for more! That set of chickens were friendly,a really nice bunch. I was told not to handle them, it would kill them and we’d get less eggs, so the next batch the kids weren’t allowed to touch. That bunch was mean. This next bunch, we have 12 and the kids are allowed to handle all they want and the chickens are friendly. My youngest (8) plays hide and seek, tag and races with them and she calls them honey and sugar…when I saw your photo of your child in the pen with the chicks, I thought to myself, “Raising Children”. Farming is the best environment for children! Good luck.