Have you ever been to the Cumberland Plateau in TN?
Aside from the occasional tornado warning and black widow spider, this is arguably God’s Country.
Still have all 4 seasons, but much longer of the best ones – Spring and Fall!
Still have deciduous trees so Fall is absolutely gorgeous (unlike SD which is almost entirely grass or pine, though beautiful in it’s own right).
And the growing season is soooooooooooooooo long compared to cold, cloudy, dreary, never-see-the-sun NYS.
We are so thankful God brought our little family to Tennessee. <3
We are Ryan and Tiffany Houseman, and our family homesteads 23 acres with our 2 littles, 2 old tractors, 40 some chickens (that number is always changing!), 2 calves and 2 barn cats.
<— These were the first hay bales off our field!
We have harvested some of our own chickens, sent dozens to the butcher, collect anywhere from 2 to 14 eggs a day, and love the process of caring for our animals and stewarding the land God has given us.
We now have experience with multiple ‘flavors’ of Wyandottes, Buff Orpington, Barred Rock, Rhode Island Red (the weakest breed we’ve had), Black Copper Maran, Americauna, Easter Egger, Dorking and multiple mixes. This is interesting – Easter Egger/Buffy mixes make a blue/green egg & Easter Egger/Black Copper Maran mixes make a dark chocolate colored egg (see bottom right). Dorkings make a very light cream colored egg (not pictured) and are supposed to be an exceptional heritage meat bird. Our first try did not yield that result (regarding the meat), in fact we like the dual purpose Buff Orpinton and Barred Rocks just as well, but we’re going to give them one more shot.
Our cows are Burger (brown, boy) and Milkshake (black, girl). They love to come galloping over for a new bale of hay or when we move the fence to fresh pasture. They also do sooo well with the chickens, and we’ve had less issues with predators once they joined their run/pasture area. 🙂
Please note: they are not housed together, only share an open pasture. Housing cows and chickens together can cause disease and even death for the cows because their respiratory systems can’t handle the chicken dust.
We work here. We play here. We live life here, more full than we ever have.
Our land is a mixture of everything we dreamed of and prayed for – creeks, waterfalls, rolling hay fields, trails for hiking, timber for firewood.
We have built our organic Real Minute Meals business here (see the more in depth story of our meals here) and have plans to expand it, Lord willing, here. We’ve run multiple recipe tests in the little kitchen of this lovely little home we finished building in the Spring of 2024.
You can find more of our story over here, and if you’re looking for our meals you can shop here or find us at any of the lovely shops/stores in middle Tennessee that I have listed over here. If you have questions or comments about our meals, or just want to reach out, feel free to through the form or info over here. 🙂
Thank you for being part of our journey. 🙂 God bless you, Friend!