Eight Acres - Our Story

Hello and welcome to Eight Acres 

I was like you once. I grew up in the suburbs of a small city in New Zealand. I lived in the suburbs of Brisbane for a while. Then I started to feel restless. I started to get an urge to grow my own food, to make things, to be self-sufficient.

I met my husband Pete around the same time and we lived together on a small property (five acres) west of Brisbane. We started a veggie garden, we had chickens and raised a poddy calf, we helped with milking at the local dairy farm. Gradually we built up skills and grew more and more of our own food.

We moved to the South Burnett in 2010 and lived on another small property (eight acres this time). I started my blog later that year, and when it came to choosing a name, the words “Eight Acres” seemed to sum it up. So many times I had said to people “well, we live on eight acres, so…” – I spent the weekend mowing the grass, I have a large veggie garden, we raise our own chickens and eat free-range eggs, we have our own dairy cow etc.

Then we moved to a larger property, 258 acres in Kumbia (still in the South Burnett). I didn’t change the name of my website because the size of the property didn’t matter. Yes, we bought a larger tractor, but the concept of growing our own food didn’t change.

And if that’s your dream too, it doesn’t matter if all you have is an apartment balcony, the most important thing if the desire to learn.

So here we are on our property in Kumbia, living in a second-hand house that we moved to the property and renovated over about four years. Over time we developed our veggie garden (the third time I’ve started from scratch), a food forest, we moved our chickens and set up their chicken tractors in electric fence netting so they can free-range. We moved our small herd of cattle (including the dairy cows) and got a few more to sell, but the main thing is that we butcher a few each year for ourselves.

We got honey bee hives which keep multiplying, so that now we produce a steady amount of honey and beeswax that I sell through my website, and locally at markets and various shops. I also make soap and various products. The soap started out as just an interest of mine as I’ve always loved chemistry, but then I started to enjoy the creativity of producing beautiful natural soaps. I am so happy that I can also share them with you too.

We have been inspired by permaculture principles, natural farming techniques and holistic management.

If you are like me and want to grow your own food, whether you’ve already started or you’re right at the beginning of your journey, the best part of starting this blog has been meeting like-minded people and helping them where I can.

You will find that I have documented everything I’ve learnt in my blog and in my eBooks that are available on my website. This will help you to catch up fast and start producing your own food.

The products on my website are also there to help you. Not everyone has time to make everything. You need to pick somewhere to start, you can’t do it all at once. If you want to use natural soap, but you don’t have time to learn how to make it at the moment, buy it from me! The same goes for honey and beeswax.

If you’re not in Australia, and just want to keep in touch, sign up for my newsletter here (I send an email about once a month with an update on our life) and you can follow me on social media – Facebook and Instagram.

 

Acknowledgement of Country

Eight Acres Natural Living acknowledge and respect the Wakka Wakka people, the traditional owners of this land that we live, work and play on and we respect their cultures, their ancestors and their Elders past and present and future generations.