How our Little Mountain Ranch Journey Began 

If you’ve ever wondered how we got to Little Mountain Ranch, I’m excited to re-share
the entire story with you, from the very beginning.

This is a bit of a long tale, so grab a cup of tea, cozy up, and feel free to ask any questions - you can email me at [email protected].

My mom once gave me a plaque for my kitchen that read, ‘Do not go where the path
may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail,’ by Ralph Waldo
Emerson. This quote couldn't be more fitting to describe my life journey. The path to
where we are today was anything but straight, often without a clear trail at all.

While I wouldn’t necessarily recommend our exact route, it ended here and I am grateful
The story really begins when I was about six or seven years old. My mom introduced
me to the world of Laura Ingalls Wilder through her books. Something about those
stories captivated my imagination. She then read all the Lucy Maud Montgomery
books - Anne of Green Gables, Emily of New Moon, and others, including The Girl of
the Limberlost. Each of these books profoundly influenced how I viewed the world
and what I aspired it to be. I wanted an attic filled with pumpkins and curing meat like
Ma Ingalls, a kitchen filled with baked goods and a cellar under the stairs like Marilla
and a childhood for my kids filled with hours collecting bugs in the forest and turning
their love of the weird and unusual into fascinating careers like Elnora Comstock.

I have a very active imagination and the images I constructed from the pages of the
books of my childhood made in indelible mark that would go on to inform many of
the decisions I have made in my life.

I’m grateful that I lived during a time where outdoor adventures where the norm and I
spent every spare minute outside. I had a best friend named Becky, and we were
adventurers. There was an old lot near our houses that had a house on it that had
burned down years before and all that remained was the basement and the remnants of
a garden; Iris’s, Hen of the Woods and more I couldn’t identify were still thriving.

Becky and I decided to build our own garden that we called ‘The Secret Garden,’
which was very original, I know, and spent hours transplanting the flowers from
around the house into our secret place. I wish I had a picture of it, but in my memory
it was beautiful.

I met my husband, Dan when I was just about 15, and he was 16. We’ve been
inseparable ever since. Even back then, Dan and my high school bestie, Kari-Anne
would tell you that I dreamt of owning a farm, having a large family, and keeping
some milk cows and would talk about those dreams all the time.

When Dan and I bought our first home around the age of 22, it came with about a
quarter-acre of land. I planted my very first garden there (now as I am recounting the
story I realize that it was actually my second garden) – a massive one by my standards
at the time. I recall Dan hauling in manure and compost, tilling the ground and
building up that garden for me. He made me a little sign to hang over the entrance to
the garden the said, ‘Butterchurn Farm.’ It was weedy by summer's end, but I still
managed to harvest some tomatoes and a watermelon, which I was very proud of.

That was also when I got my first flock of 25 Isa Brown laying hens. A word of advice:
start with just 5 or 6 hens. Twenty-five was overwhelming for a first-timer, especially
since I had to learn chick-raising from library books (this was before the internet was
widely available).

Most of them survived to adulthood, but not without a few casualties along the way. We lived there for a couple of years before deciding to move north, where acreages
were more affordable. I still had a dream of having a legitimate farm. We leased a
ranch that I absolutely adored – a charming off-grid log cabin surrounded by forest
and hay fields. I clearly remember the day we first saw that cabin. I walked around the
corner into the hallway and started crying because it felt like home. We stayed there
for about two years, during which time my youngest was three, and my next one up
was nine. Dan, working out of town, felt it would be safer for us to be closer to town,
given my limited experience with off-grid living, and he was right. So, we moved to a
2.5-acre property near town, where my homesteading passion really got going. I
befriended a Nubian goat breeder, and talked goats for about a year before bringing
home my first doe. Chloe, was a beautiful Nubian, and I vividly remember her first
kid, Finn. It was an exhilarating experience, my first foray into the cycle of life on a
farm. I milked her, learned to make cheese and loved every second of it. We also
raised Chantecler chickens for meat and eggs and built our first small passive solar
greenhouse. I learned how to start seeds indoors there and started to can more then I
had in years past.

Our growing family and property needs 

Soon, our family grew from two children to six, and even though we built an addition
on our house, the property itself started to feel cramped. We reconnected with a friend
who owned a neighboring property to our first off-grid cabin, and they were looking
to sell. We bought that ranch, around 200 acres, which was a lovely but challenging
experience. The house needed work, and the property lacked infrastructure like a shop
or barn. It had a small solar system, but not big enough to have a washer and dryer
consistently and with 8 kids at home it was a lot. We had kept the house in town and
juggling two properties for a while, with Dan working in town it became clear within
a year that it wasn’t the right choice for us long term. I was sad to leave, because I felt
I was giving up on my lifelong dream, but we all knew it was the right choice and
thankfully wasn’t the end of the road for my dreams of a farm.

We moved back into town to our 2.5 acre property. With eight children by then, we
knew that place wasn't our forever home, but I’ve always been grateful we were able
to be there while we looked for the perfect place. That's when we found Little
Mountain Ranch.

Finding our forever home 

It seemed out of reach – it was out of our price range and seemed too good to be true,
but fate intervened when we met the owners who were open to owner financing. This
place was a perfect blend of Dan’s and my needs – on-grid living with sufficient
infrastructure and a beautiful shop for Dan to work out of and land, barn, chicken
coop and even a root cellar for me. We’ve been here for, coming up on 9 years now
and our roots are in deep. We put in a huge garden, planted and small orchard, built an
indoor grow room, pantry and freeze dryer room and learned so much about growing
food for our family. I now share our homestead life with you through
our membership community this blog -- and have a tour of our 160 property that we call home & you can watch by joining HERE.  

Sharing our story to inspire you to follow your dreams

Like I said at the beginning of this blog, the path to get here was not straight at all, but
I’m glad it led us here. If your dreams out of reach, or the road to them doesn’t seem
clear sometimes, just keep moving ahead, holding your dreams in your heart and one
day they could come true.

In my newsletter that I send every few weeks I share with you some more moments that are happening as I live them in my blog, in my YouTube channel and on my newsletter - where I share a lot more. 

If you'd like to see a tour of our 160 acre homestead (Little Mountain Ranch) 

I love sharing our life, and how we have evolved, and I have a full tour of our 160 homestead, that you can watch here. 

Much love,
Chelsea