My family and I live in Marin County, California about 20 minutes North of San Francisco. This is our family:

Yon is my husband. Nathaniel and Wyatt are our twin boys and Eily is our daughter. My husband and I are both 41 years old. Yon loves his family. He is a true family man. He is a great father and a very supportive husband. He loves to spend time with us as well as ride his bikes through the hills, mountains, and roads of Marin County.

Nathaniel (blue shirt) is 3 1/2 years old. He is so kind-hearted, always willing to share, and loves stories and animals. Wyatt (red shirt) is also 3 1/2 years old and twenty minutes younger than Nathaniel. He is a child full of life, voice, and loves to be close to mama.

Eily is 1 1/2 years old and is a little sweetheart. She loves to play with her brothers and really seems to admire them. She definitely knows what she wants, though, and will try to get her way (which happens a lot). She is kind and affectionate. Smiley Eily is her nickname as she is usually smiling. She is a Papa’s girl already!

Langley and Genevieve are our dogs. Langley is six years old. He is a true Aussie --

full of energy and always making sure everyone is safe and accounted for. He loves the children and is great with them.

Genevieve is twelve years old. She is a

Shi-tzu and is in relax mode. She is the sweetest dog. She is enjoying the golden years.

Our home is on a small lot that borders Rings Mountain with a nice flat area for our children to play and a hillside that had been mostly overgrown and too steep to utilize.

We always thought that somehow we could use this hillside, but we weren’t quite sure how. We finally figured it out.

How can we create a more sustainable environment?

In October of 2010 my husband and I were in the design process of turning our overgrown hillside into a space where we could grow our own organic food, and have creative fun spaces for our children to enjoy -- A space where we could sit and relax, the kids could play, explore and learn about the outdoors. We have always been eco-minded but since having children we’ve begun to become more aware and our concerns are now amplified.

We have been concerned about what and how our children were learning about food. It is quite disturbing to learn about where our food comes from and how things have evolved into basically eating food, which is loaded with chemicals, hormones, additives and preservatives. We had recently viewed a few films on DVD such as Food Inc., Fast Food Nation, and other films such as these that really make you think about what you are putting into your body as well as what we are doing to our mother earth. We try to eat organic and to make healthy meals at home. Our children seldom get candy or sugar. I also try not to buy processed foods. However, we still have lots to learn.

As our garden project progressed I was also reading a book, “Made From Scratch” by Jenna Woginrich. I found this book at one of my favorite stores, Anthropology. It looked like a fun and inspiring read. For me it was a book that was about getting back to your roots. I grew up in a home where my mother made a lot of my clothes, cooked and baked everything from scratch, and we had a garden. My father would make our outdoor furniture, and we never hired anyone to mow our lawn or do work around our home. This book gave me inspiration.

The first chapter was about chickens. I thought what an excellent idea. It would be another food source for our family (eggs) and the hens would also serve as a small amount of pest control and natural fertilizer. They could also be great pets for our children and they could learn about how to care for an animal as well as learn about their role in our garden and how they are a part of an ecosystem.

“Growing Your Own Meal” was the second chapter of the book. We had already planned on growing our sustainable garden. We were diligently working on our hillside. It was a lot of work. Here are some pictures of our progress. We worked with a wonderful gentleman, José Esperanza who owns a landscaping and home maintenance company in Marin County. He helped bring our vision to fruition. Here are a few pictures of our hill as it was in transformation.

The third chapter was about beekeeping. I found this to be the most interesting chapter. The idea was so intriguing to me as I knew the plight of the honeybee with regard to Colony Collapse Disorder. It just never occurred to me that I could actually be a beekeeper.  I never pictured myself as one. What an exciting thought! I realized it would be so great to have pollinators for the garden and also to get another food source (honey) for my family. It would also be great to teach our children about bees and their vital role to the environment.

Here come the chicks.

By March of 2011 we were starting to plant our gardens and were also ready to get some chickens.

I contacted Mill Valley Chickens in January of 2011, as they offered a chicken-keeping class. I attended the class on a Saturday morning and took lots of notes. I placed my order for four chicks and awaited their arrival in early March for the boy’s birthday.  Also it just so happened that an article had just come out in a local magazine about a gentleman who gave up the corporate world to build hen houses. I contacted Mario, who owns Holland Hen Houses to order a chicken coop. His coops are very “Marin” and look nice enough for me to live in! I thought the hens would make a wonderful addition to our garden and the coop was lovely enough not to upset any neighbors. In our town it is illegal to keep chickens. I figured I was only going to have a few hens, no roosters, so how bad could that be? I did ask my neighbors (except one) and all neighbors were fine with the idea. 

I also found out during my inquiries that many of my neighbors already kept chickens. I then panicked about having to take care of baby chicks inside my home with the heat lamp etc. I cancelled my order and bought three egg laying hens. They were about 9 months old. I figured it would be much simpler at this point to just be able to put the hens in the henhouse and not worry about our Aussie eating baby chicks or my children getting burned with a heat lamp. I made sure that the hens came from a reputable source and that they were disease-free. This is something that you must be very careful about. You can read about that on the Mill Valley Chicken website. Later I would venture to try the baby chick experience. The hens were great. They soon started laying eggs.

Here is our chicken coop and our three chickens. We have a Barred Rock named “Kick”. My son, Nathaniel named her Kick because she would kick the ground looking for food.

We have a Millie Fleur named “Bon Bunny”. Wyatt named her. Eily has a Cochan hen named “Bach”.

Can I get Bees?

After reading more about bees, I started to look into how to become a hobby beekeeper. I ended up taking a beekeeping class in January of 2011. Bill Tomazuski who owns Marin Bee Company taught an evening class at a local middle school. After his class, I started reading articles, magazines and books about beekeeping and Colony Collapse Disorder. I also went to see the documentaries Vanishing of the Bees and Queen of the Sun. After seeing these films, I knew I wanted to do something to bring awareness to bees. I called Bill and ordered a package of bees and all the equipment, hive and installation and two lessons. My bees were to arrive in the Spring. The garden was coming together so beautifully. We would have chickens, bees and a garden full of fruits, vegetables, herbs, eggs and honey!

Buddha Belly Honey is Born

During this time I was working with a great healer, Heidi Hans Scott, who owns Prema Innovative Therapies. She is a remarkable healer. She has helped me with the births of my children, and has been an amazing life-coach and healer. During our time together we worked on my goals and visions. She helped me open my mind and heart to resonating with what I wanted out of life. After one of our sessions, as crazy as it sounds, I had a really wonderful idea for a honey line/label. I told a few people about it and they loved the idea. After much research though, I realized that it would take some capital that I did not have to bring my idea to fruition. I decided to put it on the back burner until I could figure it out. We had three young children and were in the middle of this garden project, so I surely had enough going on. However, she encouraged me to at least register the business name, and this is how Buddha Belly Honey was born. I moved on it quickly and thought that at least I could slowly work on my vision until I had enough capital. I did not think I was going to start my business so quickly without my original idea, but there were some major events that happened that were the catalyst for making my idea change form. Since then, my vision has changed a bit but I think it has changed in a wonderful way. There will be more about this in my next blog. So stay tuned.

I am not a master gardener. I am not an experienced beekeeper or chicken keeper. I am merely a stay-at-home mom just trying to get back to

my roots. In this process I hope to learn so much and share what I am learning with my children, family, friends and neighbors. My blog will take you through my process -- the ups and downs of urban farming, advocating for changes in ordinances and laws, and how to keep bees and chickens. I hope you enjoy this journey with me.