Writer With A Farm

For the love of growing, eating, creating and doing

● Featured Article

  • The Introduction

    Good Day all! My name is Ayana and I’m glad you’ve stumbled upon my blog today. As this is my first post, I want to tell you a little about myself I hope that it inspires you to go after the life you want.

                    I fell in love with writing accidently. I had been given a pad of construction paper and began drawing pictures.  As time went on, I started writing words within my pictures which turn into writing poems to go along with them. Soon my pad was filled more with poems than pictures.

      In high school, thought watching the show Charmed I thought my calling was to be a baker and went to a trade school for baking. While learning to bake, I was also in a poetry club and I started writing a screen play and several books. Life got in the way and I never got around to finishing them.

                    I went to college for English with a minor in creative writing, after realizing I really passionate about writing. I started working on finishing on of the books I started in college. During this time I lost 70 lbs and discovered a passion for nutrition and thought about writing a cook book. I also got introduced to Open Mic and started writing more poetry.

    Post college I applied for a writing job and actually got it but went with a different opportunity that ended up being a sales job. To this day I kick myself for not taking that writing job. I, again, started working on finishing the books I started and started going to open mics on a regular basis. I Eventually got the courage to start performing.  I started to dream of performing at big open mic competitions.

    I started my first professional job and getting caught up in getting out of debt and building a career, writing, again, took a back seat. During this time, I also discovered my love of growing things and had a new dream of eventually being a writer with a farm.  I started working more hours and bought 6 acres in which to build a farm. I met my husband, got married, became a mom and focused a lot on building my gardens and growing my own food but I wasn’t writing. I didn’t have time; it wasn’t a priority. Recently I stopped and evaluated my life.  I am making progress at getting out of debt, I am building my gardens and getting chickens, I have a wonderful husband, a beautiful and sweet baby girl and I was taking steps with building my homestead. The only thing missing was writing. My goal in life was to be a writer with a farm and the only thing missing was me taking the steps to be a writer.  So here I am.

    This blog is me achieving my dreams. This blog will encompass all of my favorite things: coffee, gardening, baking, nutrition, homesteading, poetry and short stories. I hope you join me on this journey of building the life I’ve always dreamed of and I hope following me inspires you to do the same.

  • The Joy of an Imperfect kitchen

    I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t fascinated with cooking. I always say my passion is writing but when I look back my love for cooking precedes my love of writing. I remember being 5 years old and exciting to make brownies in my God sister’s easy bake oven.

    It wasn’t until this week that I realized what a creative outlet cooking and baking is for me. What I love most about cooking is that there are so many ways to make the same thing. If you look up a chocolate chip cookie recipe you’ll probably find hundreds of different recipes, everyone claiming theirs is the best.

    Cooking and baking can be a science or an art and most times is a little of both. Lately, however it seems people have focused more on the science of cooking and baking.  Everything has to be precise, everything has to be perfect. I say, what fun is perfection?

    This past week I took a almost week old sponge that was originally meant to make whole wheat sourdough sandwich bread and turned it into chocolate chip cookies. I measured 2 cups of flour and two eggs. Everything else was poured free hand. I couldn’t tell you how much butter or sugar cinnamon or chocolate chips I used. I don’t even know how much of the sponge I started with. What I do know is I made a good batch of sourdough chocolate chip cookies. No weighing hardly any measurements and still created a yummy cookie.

    Sourdough chocolate chip cookies

    Initially when I first thought of blogging I wanted to create recipes. A dream of mine was to publish a cookbook but as I looked at the recipes out there I realized that creating recipes felt too much like screaming into the void. What is needed more than anything right now is frameworks that gives space for creativity, encouragement to try something different and possibly fail, to remind the world that food does not have to be perfect to be good. I experiment a lot in my kitchen. Most of the times things some out good. Sometimes it’s a fail but every time it is fun and a learning experience.

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