Now that I have some time away from the country, albeit a mere few weeks, I think it’s time to answer many questions that have come my way and also discuss what I would have done differently. I had been dreaming about a country move for many moons; I imagined I’d be clipping wild flowers daily, growing my own vegetables, raising chickens and maybe have some goats or a mini cow to tend to. Originally we had discussed Napa, California and I still stand by that it would have been a more successful venture than North Carolina and I shall explain my thought on this for any other urbanite considering taking the plunge into a rural life.
So let me discuss some things that went awry with my adventure. My husband and I had drove out to North Carolina and started looking for a place that we could call home. After seeing nearly 50+ properties we found a beautiful house on 3 acres of land in a very rural area. It was less expensive then our former 1 bedroom apartment in Los Angeles and I was beyond thrilled. I started mentally planning my little farm in my head. My husband had a job lined up before we got there so he went to work and I went to sign the lease. While I was signing the lease the owner of the property dropped the bombshell on me that we could not have any other animals on our property other than our dogs, ‘but my chickens’, I thought and my mini cow and goats? Poof, dream one killed. I swallowed and tried not to cry when the second bombshell came out that our 3 acres of land was zoned as National forest or park or something, we could not plant anything on our 3 acres we could only keep plants on our small deck. I knew that my husband was expecting keys so I couldn’t run out screaming, we were tired, wanted a place to live and so I signed the lease, regretfully. I had signed a lease to live in the middle of nowhere for a year and the most I could do was grow herbs on our small deck something I could have done at our tiny apartment in L.A.
So here’s my advice to urbanites wanting to go country. I had 12 months to ponder this whilst I looked outside at the same expanse of green every.day. for nearly 365 long days. If you want to move to a rural area and you are from the city, consider moving to a place where a major city is accessible by car within an hour or two. The Hudson Valley in New York is ideal as there is a train that runs 14 times a day to take you from your farm to the most bustling city in the world. Napa is a good choice as it’s a little over an hour drive to beautiful San Francisco. My best friend from highschool moved to a small farm in Maryland which is an hour drive to Washington D.C. which she frequents regularly. Parts of Virginia are also easily accessible to D.C. and you can find beautiful homes to have a mini farm. This advice is strictly for those that have grown up in a city environment as you may think you are tired of it, but you will find that an infusion of city life will be welcome and in my case needed.
One of the things my husband and I missed the most was being able to walk to places, even if we drove we weren’t in an area that had a lot of charming places to say have breakfast (I Hop was our only choice for breakfast, no thank you). Not all of North Carolina is like this of course, Asheville which is an adorable little city would be a great choice if you are considering NC, you can find rural and be able to drive into Asheville and have a ton of great places to eat and lot’s of window shopping abound.
Before moving to the country consider urban homesteading. Lot’s of places in the city allow chickens now (you don’t don’t need a rooster to have chickens that lay eggs so forgo the rooster, your neighbors will be very grateful). See if you can join a community garden, they are tough to get into but if you can you will learn a ton. Even on the smallest windowsill, fire escape and balcony you can start an edible garden. You Grow Girl is an addictive site for novice gardeners. There are tons of great books about growing edible gardens in limited spaces these are some to look into-Small Space Container Gardens, The Edible Balcony.
I have more to add, but this is a lot for a Monday so I shall leave you with the above nuggets of experience. Feel free to ask me any specific questions in the comments. I love your emails, but it’s hard to answer the same questions over and over again so I figured I would write these thoughts out for you here and if you had more questions lay them on me.
Have any of you tried urban homesteading? Small container gardening? Raising chickens in the city? I’d love to know!
P.S. I got the cool vintage seed artwork from this fun resource. I think they would make great prints.
Miss Tristan B. is the proprietress of Besotted Brand and the writer of this delightful blog. She recently re-located to sunny Seattle with her handsome husband and two pup.
What a pity about your farm project! I am trying to do it too, almost in the center of our city. May be you can arrange your plants like this:
http://www.houzz.com/photos/3993711/Groveland-House-contemporary-landscape-dallas
Lilia
Lilia, we don’t have as much room in our new place but I absolutely plan on edible container gardening while we have sun! I also want to try my hand at some wildflowers if possible:)
oh my gosh…i’m so sorry to hear about your experience…but i so needed to read this…we’ve, well it’s actually me, that is having a major crisis with living in california. i’m stuck behind the orange curtain here in newport beach….at least you live in los angeles darling…just last week i posted how i was ready to sell our beautiful house for a farm in the midwest…but that whole story about going somewhere for breakfast makes so much sense…yesterday we walked for hours right here in our neighborhood with our dogs at the ocean…
the grass is always greener…time to fertilize my own!
love,
katie
Katie, oh yes, California is a dream especially if you want to bring in some urban farming in your backyard (even your front)! I told my husband that the experiment in the country would have been more successful (where we went) if we just took a long vacation there instead!
I’m so sorry your country home wasn’t so great. I think your advice is exactly right. I live in a little town in the mountains east of San Diego. We’ve got chickens and ducks and someday I’d like some alpaca or sheep. The environment is a little harsh for large-scale gardening, but I’m trying little by little to grow flowers and a few vegetables. I actually work “down the hill” in the suburbs, and it’s so nice to be able to pick up groceries and go to Target before heading for home.
Marne, you are in a perfect place to do your farming rural life, close to San Diego and a 2 hour drive to the City of Angels if you wanted! Above ground beds are good for tricky soil situations, lettuces are supposed to be the easiest to have success with:) I am planning to add some resources for gardening soon.
I’m sorry that that broke your heart! That’s horrible…I know how excited you were for mini cows.
We live in a small town that has been a farming community for centuries. It has the older college West of the Mississippi and there is consistently a feeling of small town living, even with it growing larger and larger with every year. I use to be able to see deer when I drove to my parent’s house and there were flocks of damn peacocks that roamed around. Now, it’s more difficult to find the wild animals but it’s not horrible. I do so love Forest Grove!
I desperately want chickens in my life and have been trying to convince my husband for a while. He tells me that I don’t need another thing to deal with in addition to the fact that we might move at any minute but still….I would love to have fresh eggs.
Instead, I have a raised garden bed that I’m trying not to break the plants growing there, a section of succulents that I’m growing to balance with the succulents that are already there and four buckets full of tomato plants with herbs growing underneath to help with the tomatoes growth. It’s good times!
I love that you have tomato’s! Let me know if you get chickens so I can live vicariously!
Hi Tristan!
This is Wendi (and Joanne) from ELLE DECOR stopping by to say hi. I came across your beautiful, beautiful blog and was delighted to find that it was your creation. Welcome back to the Left Coast! We certainly miss you here in LA. All the best to you and your husband as you make Seattle your home!
Hi Wendi! Thank you for the sweet words and give Joanne a big hug for me;)
Oh my goodness! How awful! I can somewhat relate. I thought living in Morocco would be much like living in the country might have been for you. I pictured an exotic retreat where we all spoke fluent French and Arabic and life would be exciting every day. Some of it was exactly as I imagined it, except that after a while even our wildly colored life had become boring to me. I remember meeting so many people who loved it, but I realized after a while that I could not live someone else’s dream. I guess life is funny like that. We moved to Denmark and even though I have to learn another language, I have never been so happy! I hope this next phase will be full of happiness and new adventures for you! Sometimes life just works that way, right?
I agree I would have thought the same thing about Morocco, but Denmark sounds pretty exotic and spectacular as well. It’s nice to be able to try a location on for size, that way there are no regrets:) I hope this phase will be happy and filled adventure as well, thank you!
A bit of reality for people who think living in the country would be so wonderful. I have lived pretty much my whole life on a farm but like to think of my self a girl with city in her soul. I love the country don’t get me wrong, but it is a lot of work to live here and we don’t even have the animals that make it sound so attractive to people except for 17 chickens and 2 dogs. They have to be fed, gardens tended, no municipal utilities to take care of you, a 7 mile drive in the car for any shopping or recreation. Maintaining our orchards takes 100 percent of my husbands time. We have a wonderful life but it is a good thing that both my husband and I are workaholics as that is what it takes to keep our place going. So the next time you look longingly at someones life in the country, be realistic about the lifestyle you dream of having and whether you are willing to work that hard to stay afloat.
It is a huge challenge and take a lot of money to work on acres of land, so maybe it was for the best? I still would have loved chickens and a vegetable garden:)
I was born in a little city outside Porto,where i currently live and always had an hunger from city life and has i grown my need to balance that came in a strong way…there are a lot of urban gardens and shared backyards where people can grow their vegetables and also 60 per cent of all the house in Porto have huge planting spaces,so i feel lucky for being in a city but i can still feel calm and enjoy all the green :)
Sounds like the best of both worlds!