The Homestead Farm at Fruit Hill Orchard

Today I'm talking with Emily at The Homestead Farm at Fruit Hill Orchard.

 

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00:00 You're listening to A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters, and topics adjacent. I'm your host, Mary Lewis. Today I'm talking with Emily  at the Homestead Farm at Fruit Hill Orchard  in Virginia. Good morning, Emily. How are you? Good morning. I'm doing great. Thanks for having me on today. Thank you for making the time. I know that you guys are all very, very busy people.  How is the weather there today?

00:28 It is sunny. It's beautiful.  The past week or so we've had a thunderstorm every day.  So, um, I don't know what's coming up later, but right now it's just beautiful. Yeah, I'm in Minnesota and it is very sunny. There's a light breeze, but it's also like 80 degrees with heavy humidity. So  I'm to be spending the day working on my podcast inside. Cause that seems like a good idea. Nice.  Yep.

00:57 have laptop, we'll get work done. That's good.  So tell me about yourself and what you do.  So  I am an owner of the Homestead Farm at Fruit Hill Orchard.  We opened in 2016.  I am a farmer,  a baker.  I do all the stuff behind the scenes. I manage our social media.  I plan our events. kind of the

01:28 everything at the farm,  which is a lot, but  yeah, it's great.  we

01:40 The farm has been in our family since right  after the Civil War.  My great-great-grandfather James Swate opened an apple and peach packing plant there.  And then my grandfather  carried on the tradition and has been farming there  since the 60s, I believe.  So the property has been in our family for a really long time.

02:08 Kind of why we got our name the Homestead Farm, because it's on our family's homestead. And then the Fruit Hill Orchard part comes from my grandfather's orchard business, which is Fruit Hill Orchard. nice. So do you have old photos from from generations past? Yes, we do. We so my grandfather, his grandmother grew up there.

02:36 And we have pictures of her out back with  the old windmill, which funny story, she  accidentally  rolled her car into the windmill and knocked it over in the  80s, I think.  And  we  have since put a new windmill up in her honor. But  yeah, we have old photos of the family. The building next door that was the Apple and Peach packing plant, that used to be a barn,  but now it is a

03:06 warehouse type building,  but we have pictures of that before they enclosed the barn area and change that around.  Yeah, old pictures of the house. Our farm market was actually the carriage barn  where my grandmother stored her car and my great grandmother,  um, stored her car. So  yeah, lots of interesting history there for sure. And pictures.  I love it.  Um,

03:35 the reason I asked is our house is over a hundred years old  and We've only been living here for almost five years and I keep trying to find someone who knows anything about the property because it's been here a long time  and Nobody lives around here that knows anything about it from a hundred years ago So I'm out of luck on the history Yeah, you'll have to