The gift economy is a beautiful thing. A few weeks ago, two retired ladies came early to the farm stand to help harvest. They returned two weeks later with handmade hats for our whole family, and a homemade blanket for the baby.
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"Getting and spending we lay waste our power"--but in giving we grow strong again.
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12/02/2020
Beautiful beets!
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12/01/2020
Come out this Saturday for free veggies, as well as a give-trade-swap table.
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We are moving to Dallas this month, so this will be the LAST farm stand we host in San Marcos.
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Come at 8am if youâd like to help harvest. The giveaway will run from 9am-noon. As always, well be at 907 Horace Howard Dr, San Marcos TX 78666.
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We started this farm stand because we didnât know how else to be faithful in this strange, perilous year. To all who came, received, harvested, and gave, THANK YOU. You have been part of Godâs work among us this year.
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Please keep us in your prayers as we pack up and prepare o move to Dallas, where we will be working with to start a village and farm for the chronically homeless of the city.
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11/14/2020
If you didn't come out to the farm stand this morning, you missed some pretty gorgeous carrots. Our goal is to have at least one more farm stand before our move in December, so keep your eyes on this page for announcements about the date.
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11/13/2020
We'll be giving away veggies and more from 9am-Noon on November 14, 2020. Come join us at 907 Horace Howard Dr, San Marcos TX. â
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We should have plenty of greens, sweet potatoes, turnips, and more! Come and take freely. You are also welcome to bring food to swap or give if you'd like.â
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We'll also have a give-swap-take table set up with all manner of treasure: baby clothes, toys, housegoods, and more. Think of it as a "free yard sale." Like the veggies, bring your own items to give or swap, if you wish. â
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If you'd like to help harvest, come at 8am with a water bottle and we'll put you to work! â
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This is an outdoor event, so masks are optional, but please be mindful of others by maintaining a safe distance. â
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11/12/2020
Soapmaking is one of the many crafts that seems out of reach in this season of parenting small children. I'd like for making a quarterly or monthly batch of soap to be part of the rhythm of our household, but given the process, it's not something I can safely do with a toddler underfoot or a baby who needs to nurse on demand.
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This weekend we were joined by dear friends, and while talking Friday evening, one of them mentioned that she was interested in learning to make soap. "Then let's make soap tomorrow!" I said. She had never gone through the process before, and I had to stop periodically to nurse the baby, but together we produced a fine batch of soap. I sent her home with half of it and kept the rest for us.
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It might seem like a small thing, but it reminded me that life in community, for all its challenges, is so much more fruitful than life alone.
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For those who are interested in such details, the soap is a lard-coconut oil - olive oil blend, colored with turmeric.
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11/11/2020
âHe has balanced the love of change in them by a love of permanence. He has contrived to gratify both tastes together in the very world He has made, by that union of change and permanence which we call Rhythm. He gives them the seasons, each season different yet every year the same, so that spring is always felt as a novelty yet always as the recurrence of an immemorial theme. He gives them in His Church a spiritual year; they change from a fast to a feast, but it is the same feast as before.â
(Chapter 25 of C.S. Lewisâs The Screwtape Letters)
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11/08/2020
The dismantling of the garden begins. A bittersweet moment blessed by the presence of such good friends and helpers.
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10/31/2020
Volunteers this morning from the Philippines and England helping bunch of greens, wash sweet potatoes, harvest lemon grass, and captivate one little girl. Come on out this morning and share some of the harvest with us!+
907 Horace Howard Drive, San Marcos 78666. Will be out with veggies from nine until noon.
10/28/2020
We'll be giving away veggies and more from 9am-Noon on All Hallows' Eve, October 31, 2020. Come join us at 907 Horace Howard Dr, San Marcos TX. â
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We should have plenty of greens, sweet potatoes, turnips, and more! Come and take freely. You are also welcome to bring food to swap or give if you'd like.
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We'll also have a large give-swap-take table set up with all manner of treasure: baby clothes, toys, housegoods, and more. Think of it as a "free yard sale." Like the veggies, bring your own items to give or swap, if you wish.
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If you'd like to help harvest, come at 8am with a water bottle and we'll put you to work! â
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This is an outdoor event, so masks are optional, but please be mindful of others by maintaining a safe distance. â
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10/27/2020
I waited all spring and summer for enough butterfly pea flowers make some lovely blue concoction. I settled on a simple syrup which I can use with sparkling water, lemonade, tea, and more.
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About 1 TBS of dried flowers turned 2 cups of water this gorgeous turquoise. Iâll be saving seeds so next year I can have a whole garden full of vines.
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10/25/2020
Saving seeds. Itâs a better metaphor for this season than âuprootingâ: less brutal, less homeless, more hopeful.
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Truth be told, weâve felt uprooted in one way or another for the past two years, as weâve sought a bit of land where our familyâs vocationâfarming with the poor, teaching, writing, life in community â can flourish. We thought San Marcos might be that soil: there were promising connections, hopeful conversations.
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2020 has brought fearsome and beautiful marvels to the world. In our household, that has meant pregnancy, ordination, job loss, the farm stand, a new job for Bethany, a brilliant baby boy, and now, a new job for Steven that will move us to Dallas at the end of the year. Steven will be joining The Human Impact, an incredible relational ministry to the homeless, as that organization launches a village for men and women on the streets. As a deacon, he will be calling a community to glorify God as they live into a covenant of prayer, mission, and solidarity.
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And so we are collecting seeds from our years in Austin and San Marcos, gathering promises for our new home. We are excited, delighted, grateful, but deeply aware that there is mighty work in front of us. As we prepare for the daunting work of moving with two babies, five chickens, and an enormous dog, we will need your prayers and partnership. We will need to people to answer Godâs call and live alongside us in this new village. We will need echinacea and yarrow for healing, Rosaâs cotton,â hibiscus, indigo, and purple-pied beans. Soon it will be time to plant.
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#2020
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âThe LORD God settled the man in the garden of Eden to cultivate and to keep itâŚ.â (Genesis 2:15)
Avodah Family Farms began in the fall of 2018. Thanks to the hospitality of our friends at Blessing Falls Family Farm, we were able to begin a small operation growing vegetables using regenerative agriculture practices. We launched a "CSA" (subscription-based produce sales) in January of 2019, and soon had customers from across Austin, Texas receiving weekly boxes of our produce, as well as eggs and meat grown by other regenerative farmers.
We knew, however, that God's call was not simply to grow and sell food, but to create a farm that would be a blessing to the poor. In the summer of 2019, we put a hold on all our subscriptions and began to explore options for relocating the farm to a location where it was better suited to provide ministry and dignified income opportunities. God blessed this search, and this fall we will be moving to the San Marcos, Texas area to create not just a farm, but a homestead community. Our years living and working at Community First! Village have filled us with hope that God is calling His people to respond to a culture of homelessness and isolation, and we pray that the homestead will be an example of this faithful response.
In this new season, we look forward to exploring new ways Avodah Family Farms can exist to cultivate love for the land for the poor through food. The word translated âcultivateâ in Genesis 2:15 comes from the Hebrew avodah, a rich term that can refer to the tending of the soil, the service of a servant to a master, the worship of God, and more.
We believe that restoring the relationship between the wise cultivation of our food and the service of our God is the first step to keeping community, creativity, and hospitality at the core of the life of Godâs people, the Church.
Once we are settled we will have opportunities to volunteer, subscribe to our produce, and support the ministry of the farm financially. For now, please join us in prayer as we make this move into the next season.