Many farm-related businesses are seasonal. Our farm stand is open to the public from Memorial Day weekend through the end of November each year. It can be quite tricky to have enough inventory to have a nice selection of items for customers without being stuck with more than we need over the winter months. In […]

A big part of Etsy is the ability to connect buyers with makers. (If you’re not familiar with Etsy, be sure to check out Part 1 of this article!) One of my favorite parts about running the farm stand is meeting my customers face-to-face. While this isn’t possible when you are selling online, Etsy does […]

Have you heard of Etsy? It is an online marketplace where vendors can sell handmade and/or vintage goods. Selling on Etsy has lots of benefits for us. It has a lot of name recognition and has been around long enough to be a publicly-traded company. Lots of lifestyle magazines feature  products found on the site. […]

It’s hard to see with a flashlight when the batteries are running low. It’s frustrating to tackle a project with a cordless drill that stops working halfway through. Keeping your batteries charged makes life easier because your tools work correctly when you need them. The most important tool on a farm or homestead is…you! It’s […]

We plant rows of sunflowers every year here in the gardens at Pleasant Valley Farm. These beautiful flowers provide a surprising number of benefits! Our garden field is roadside, next to our farm stand. Each spring it’s exciting to see tidy rows of vegetable plants. But as the season progresses, it seems each year the […]

This is always a busy time on our farm. The garden is at peak production and I try to preserve any produce left over at the end of our market days. On days the stand isn’t open, I’m usually found in our processing kitchen making jams, salsas, pickles, and more. There are also plenty of […]

Here at Pleasant Valley Farm, we raise a number of heritage breeds and try to be active in helping to conserve them as well. We like Dexter cattle because they are great homestead cows, produce a nice beef carcass, calve easily and are great mothers, are hardy, easy keepers, give a nice amount of milk […]

Have you heard of livestock being called a heritage breed? Have you ever wondered what exactly that meant? Is it a buzzword, or something that matters? Most importantly, could they be a good fit for your homestead? Simply put, a heritage breed has been around for a long time and was generally developed in a […]

Agritoursim is a big word that sounds intimidating. It’s simply the idea of making your farm a destination, somewhere with something interesting to do or see beyond buying your products. Still, farm open houses, hayrides and the like can be overwhelming. Customers have suggested opening up a spare bedroom in our farmhouse as a bed […]

Although our hatching season has ended, this is the time of year we have money to invest in equipment and livestock for our farm’s future. With that in mind, I thought it would be a great time to follow up on our first post about hatching poultry and take an in-depth look at the kind […]