We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Samantha Walker. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Samantha below.
Samantha, we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?
Before I began living a home centered life, I severely underestimated the work load that comes with it. As a wife, mother, and farmer, much is required of me. With so many different hats to wear(and obligations to juggle), I have developed quite the resilient spirit. It’s only one in a tool belt full of traits I’ve cultivated over the years. Next to resilience hangs patience, consistency, delightfulness, determination, intentionality, and grace. These aren’t all traits that I’ve mastered, by any means. I’m not perfect. Overwhelm is a constant threat with so much on my plate. But the source of my resilience is steadfast, unchanging, and made strong when I am weak. He is known by many names, most others simply call Him God, but I choose to refer to Him as Yahweh.
I grew up attending a Southern Baptist church. There, I was shown a very skewed version of God. I was taught about the wrath of the Lord of the Old Testament. I knew the stories of judgment and disappointment. I saw Him as an angry Father and constantly struggled with guilt and shame. As I came into motherhood, I was introduced to the true character of Yahweh. He is El-Roi, God who sees me. ME. Not just us as a collective human species. He sees me, the individual. He loves me, His daughter. He made the ultimate sacrifice to save me from an eternity apart from Him. ME.
As I began reading The Word and getting to know Him more, that’s when my tool belt started filling up. By getting to know His character, my own underwent transformation. The nature of my relationship with Yahweh is exactly why we named our homestead Harrow Farms. We named it after the agricultural equipment used to till and break apart the soil. The tool for preparing land for sowing. The predecessor to growing and harvesting in abundance.
Homesteading has taught me that everything in life is seasonal. Things may be bad, but I can endure because it’s only for a season. Things might be great, and I can fully enjoy them because it might only be for a season. In Ecclesiastes chapter three there is an often quoted verse that so encompasses the beauty of resilience. It says for everything there is a season. A time for birth and death. A time for planting and harvesting. A time to tear down, a time to build. It goes on and on, but you get the gist. It’s a great reminder that yes, hardship is going to happen. Yes, there will be mourning. But oh what joy, what peace, what success, what pure delight there will be too. Surrendering to Yahweh and His will is where I found my resilience, and you can too.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
In all honesty I really struggle to encompass what it is that I do in one short sweet title. While I do create content to share our life online (I can be found on YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook) in hopes of encouraging other like-minded moms, I find that “content creator” doesn’t give an accurate image of my full occupation. When it’s required, I generally just say that I’m a homemaker. That title is pretty broad spectrum though and can look so vastly different from one person to another. I am a curator of a home-centered life. My days are full of cooking from scratch, teaching my children, tending our livestock and gardens, and sharing it online.
At home we have three little boys ages five years, three years, and eight weeks. Above all else, they are my priority. It’s important to me that they are taught the skills to be successful in this world while also equipping them with kind hearts, joyful spirits, and a firm foundation to stand on.
On the farm our goal is to produce at least 80% of the food our family consumes. We recognize that there are things we can’t or choose not to produce ourselves. Being on only two acres, we had to choose where to prioritize our resources. Ethically raised and humanely processed animal products can be hard to find. If you’re lucky enough to have a good source, a lot of times they aren’t affordable. So we chose early in our homesteading journey to focus on the livestock first and foremost. Year round we keep a family milk cow, laying hens, and meat rabbits. Seasonally we raise a couple calves, a few pigs, meat birds, and occasionally a goat or two. Our terminal stock live the best possible lives we can provide. To us that means growing them out in a regenerative rotational grazing operation that is both beneficial to the livestock, as well as the land. Above all, our goal is to be good stewards of what Yahweh has given us.
While animal products are our priority, we do garden as well. This spring we will be planting our raised bed garden with annual vegetables, flowers, and herbs. The majority of the food grown here will be used fresh throughout the growing season. Any surplus will be canned, frozen, or dehydrated to use in the fall and winter as production slows down. We’ll be planting a new in-ground garden this year that will, for the most part, go towards providing our livestock with fresh food. During the warm months we can grow and forage the majority of the nutrients our meat rabbits need to thrive, therefore significantly offsetting their feed costs.
Currently I am most excited about the recent opening of our first business. In January of this year we received our commercial feed license and began selling raw milk for animal consumption. I believe heavily in the power of raw milk and I am so thrilled to have the opportunity to share in our abundance.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
When I think of advice for other women looking to live this lifestyle, the things that come to mind aren’t specific skills or qualities to hone. Instead, I have mindsets to establish.
First and foremost, find your “why” and seek inspiration. Finding your “why” simply means determining your motivations. Why do you want to XZY? Why homeschool, why grow food, why cook from scratch? The deeper you can root yourself into why you strive for whatever it is, the harder it will be to shake the drive you have for it. Hand in hand with knowing your deepest motivations comes seeking ongoing inspiration. Inspiration can come in so many forms. It can be found in Scripture, on a YouTube channel, in poetry, or a podcast. Seek out that which lights the fire under you. Search for the sparks that will keep your own flame ablaze when you inevitably come up against hardship and overwhelm.
Next, always remain a student. Stay teachable. Allow yourself the flexibility to be changed and molded as you journey. Wherever it is you hope to go in life, accept guidance from those who have been on the road longer. Be willing to redirect your course if and when it’s necessary. Know that backtracking isn’t as bad as continuing on the wrong path. If you come into life as a student, willing to learn, you may not harvest an abundance of physical rewards, but you’ll always reap wisdom.
Lastly find community, or build it if you have to. In the homeschooling and homesteading spheres specifically, there seems to be a tendency towards isolation. Yahweh created us to live in relationship; with Him, with the earth, and with each other. By involving ourselves with like-minded folks we open the door to collaboration. When we come together in common unity we can better our practices, lean on each other for support, and make things happen that we otherwise couldn’t on our own.
Who has been most helpful in helping you overcome challenges or build and develop the essential skills, qualities or knowledge you needed to be successful?
Without a doubt, by greatest ally in this life is my husband, Jerry. He’s my perfect counterpart. While I have a tendency to get caught up in romantic ideals, he’s the one to ground me and help make realistic plans of pursuit. When my responsibilities are too heavy, he comes along side me to carry the load. Where failure and doubt creep in, he’s there to shine a light and be my encourager. He pushes me when I need it and helps pull me back when I’ve overextended myself. With Jerry is where I feel safest and most capable. He is the reason I can confidently pursue this life. I am forever thankful to have him as my best friend.
Another huge influence has Jessica Sowards. Jess is a well known YouTube homesteader from the channel Roots and Refuge Farm. Jess is not only a dear friend, but I consider her a mentor as well. Titus 2:4 says that older women must train younger women to love their husbands and their children. Whether or not she knows it, by living in a glass house and show casing her life, she’s doing exactly that. Seeing how she operates as a wife, mother, and farmer has greatly impacted my life. I am beyond blessed to call her a friend and to have such a beautiful example of a modern, Godly woman in my life.
Contact Info:
- Website: Harrowfarms.com
- Instagram: Instagram.com/harrowfarms
- Facebook: Facebook.com/harrowfarms
- Youtube: YouTube.com/harrowfarms
