In partnership with

The Cozy Winter Ritual Behind My Energy and Glow ✨

Winter calls for rituals that actually make you feel amazing—and Pique’s Sun Goddess Matcha is mine. It delivers clean, focused energy with zero jitters, supports glowing skin and gentle detox, and feels deeply grounding on cold mornings. Smooth, ceremonial-grade, and crave-worthy, it’s the easiest way to start winter days clear, energized, and glowing from the inside out

Get Up To 20% Off

^{Audio version available below.}

If you’d rather listen while you work than read, I’ve added a full audio version of this week’s newsletter. Hit play and enjoy.

Recently, on the farm, we have been in cleanup mode, and my dad found an old document in the basement labelled “Starting a Sustainable Small Farm,” from February 6th, 2012.

Today’s newsletter is going to go into some of the info on that document and show homesteading and sustainable living hasn’t really changed in 14 years.

This might be a bit longer of a newsletter but I’m going to try and make it quick.

The document was about starting a 25 member CSA on half an acre. It broke down exactly how much to plant, how many beds to use, and when to plant them.

What surprised me wasn’t the crops.

It was the thinking.

Because the principles in that document are the same ones that still work today.

1. Think in Beds, Not in Random Rows

Everything in that plan was laid out in 4 foot wide raised beds, roughly 100 feet long.

Not scattered rows.
Not random spacing.
Not guessing.

Beds make production predictable. They make fertilizer predictable. They make irrigation simple. And they make scaling possible.

Even on a backyard level, thinking in defined beds changes everything.

2. Don’t Plant Everything at Once

This is the biggest mistake I see every spring.

People plant all their squash the same weekend. All their cucumbers the same week. All their lettuce at once.

Then June hits and everything is ready at the same time.

The 2012 document staggered plantings:

• squash every two weeks

• cucumbers once a month

• beets and greens repeated

• melons planted in waves

That’s called succession planting. It spreads out harvest, reduces pest pressure, and keeps you from drowning in produce.

That hasn’t changed in 14 years.

3. Fertility Was Systematic

Every crop listed consistent inputs.

Rock phosphate.
Organic fertilizer.
Mulch.

It wasn’t random.

Healthy soil wasn’t optional. It was assumed.

That’s still true today. You can’t shortcut soil and expect steady production.

4. Plan One Season Ahead

This part stood out the most.

While spring crops were growing, they were already thinking about:

• cover cropping other acreage

• preparing fall beds

• recruiting CSA members

They weren’t reacting. They were planning forward.

That’s the difference between gardening and farming.

Now here’s the important part.

The dates in that document were specific to our zone. Your frost dates might be different. Your timing might shift.

But the principles stay the same:

Plant in systems.
Stagger your crops.
Feed your soil.
Think ahead.

Homesteading and sustainable living haven’t changed much in 14 years because biology hasn’t changed.

Soil still needs nutrients.
Plants still need timing.
And systems still beat motivation.

We’re about to start laying out beds again for spring, and going back through that document reminded me that most “new” ideas are just old principles applied consistently.

If there’s interest, I’ll break down how we map out a full spring garden using those bed and succession ideas without making it overwhelming.

Reply back and tell me if you’d want to see that.

– Tim Parker
Start My Homestead