Exploring Life & Business with Christine Bailey

Today we’d like to introduce you to Christine Bailey.

Christine, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I grew up in the 80s in a lovely, primarily Italian-American neighborhood in suburban New Jersey just 30 miles from Manhattan. It was me, my parents, and my older brother. I loved swimming at the community pool and riding bikes. I believed I had a black thumb, while I watched my mom garden in our yard and create a whimsical and beautiful space with flowers and trees.

I was always wooed by the beauty and found solace in nature and had a very vivid imagination. I also loved anything creative – all kinds of art and writing. I never imagined I’d become a farmer. My Italian immigrant grandfather, who came to the U.S. through Ellis Island as a teenager, turned his entire New Jersey backyard into a tomato garden, so this is definitely in my blood, although I NEVER imagined I’d become a farmer. Unfortunately, I don’t remember my Italian grandfather, because he passed away when I was two years old. I was very close with my Italian-American family growing up and it was a huge part of my childhood to spend time around dinner tables with chairs crammed in to include as many people as possible.

I ventured away from the northeast to attend study Music Business at Belmont University in Nashville. I quickly embraced living in the South, wooed by the glory of ’90s country music and middle Tennessee’s rolling green hills. During and post-college, I worked in the Christian music industry on tour promotions and new album releases for artists such as Caedmon’s Call, Bebo Norman, Third Day, and Jars of Clay. This was before the age of social media, so we used old-fashioned phone calls, posters, and message boards.

Post college, I met my husband and moved to Dallas. I left the music industry and was given the unique opportunity to help start an African relief non-profit called Mocha Club. For five years, I had the joy of helping tell the stories of my African brothers and sisters and recruiting supporters for our education, HIV/AIDS, women at risk, orphan care, and clean water projects.

Somewhere in the midst, we started learning about real food. After seeing the documentary, Food, Inc., in 2009, we began to passionately pursue organically and sustainably grown food from local farmers. We jumped into our tiny VW Rabbit and visited nearby Texas farms where we loaded up huge coolers full of local meats, cheese, freshly baked bread, and organic produce.

Word quickly spread, and soon we were distributing this nutritionally dense and beautifully-raised food to friends and their friends in Dallas parking lots. Out of this newfound passion, we started Urban Acres, an organic produce co-op, organic market, and urban farm. Our produce co-op started with 17 families and grew to over 2,300. I illustrated chalkboards for our farm store and worked the register with a newborn baby strapped to my chest. That same baby grew into a toddler who walked around the corner to our own market and knew where her food came from.

Urban Acres was an incredible experience, but after 11 years in the city and another baby, we yearned for our own land and the opportunity to grow our own organic food. We felt the winds of change carrying us to Tennessee, where I’d always hoped to return.

In 2015, our family moved to Tennessee to pursue our own land and farm. We bought a 1940s farmhouse with 17 acres of blank land in Santa Fe (it’s pronounced “Santa Fee”), TN. On the first day of spring 2017, we broke ground and began plowing the soil that has become Kindred Farm.

Since then, cultivating connection has been the heartbeat of everything we do. We’re raising vibrant produce, flowers, and bees in a sustainable way that heals the land and grows into beautiful food. We also gather the community at long farm tables under the stars at our seasonal Kindred Dinners. We believe life is meant to be shared in the community, and we create our unique, handmade artisan goods for The Kindred Farm Store with that in mind. My husband, Chef Steven (“The Korean Farmer”) has grown and expanded his private chef business all over the Nashville area for weekly clients as well as special occasion dinners.

Kindred Farm is a place where you can come and be nourished: find a connection in the land, in the community, and around the table. Slow down, exhale, and then take some “kindred” home with you, wherever they go.

Now, The Kindred Life is in your hands! After over 20 years of being a writer, I released my first book, The Kindred Life: Stories and Recipes to Cultivate a Life of Organic Connection, in May 2022 with Harper Collins! I also launched my podcast, The Kindred Life, at the end of 2022, and I love sharing with listeners each week how we can live more bravely, purposefully, and connected to the people and tangible experiences that matter most.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Absolutely not! There have been SO MANY blunders, struggles, and learning lessons along the way. Our first farming season in particular was full of them, as we figured things out as we went and faced a lot of roadblocks. But it was the best way to learn, and I developed real grit for maybe the first time in my life.

With situations like pigs escaping, chicken drama, and newbie farmer mistakes, we quickly adopted the motto, “Progress Over Perfection.” If I’ve learned anything since becoming a farmer, it’s that striving for perfection is absolutely paralyzing, and perfection isn’t even possible. If we get hung up on perfection in farming, we’ll fail almost every time because we’re dealing with so many elements beyond our control – seeds get killed by a late frost, animals escape, irrigation lines bust and leak. But progress works – we keep moving forward, learning from our mistakes, and getting better at what we do, little by little. Progress says that abundant life comes in the journey itself, not the end result. I truly believe this!

Every year, we evaluate what worked, what didn’t work, and what we want to change. Each year, we’ve honed in more on what Kindred has to uniquely offer. As I continue to grow my writing work and my podcast and everything we do here on the farm, I know now that I do not have to do everything. I can just focus on doing WELL what I’ve been given to do and to share.

I see all the scars and wrinkles and strength I’ve gained as beautiful markers of how far I’ve come, and I’m proud of what I’ve learned from walking into the unknown.

Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about The Kindred Farm and The Kindred Life Podcast?
What I believe sets me apart from others is my unique journey as a former music industry gal turned social entrepreneur turned author, podcaster, and organic produce farmer. And there is a deep heart for connection in EVERYTHING we do, and I think that shows. I believe that something magical happens around the table, and our souls were meant for connection, and life is meant to be shared in the community.

Kindred is a regenerative farm, so we believe in stewarding the land through farming practices that restore the soil & help the ecosystem flourish. We currently raise bees, vibrant produce (lots of Asian and Italian inspired!), & whimsical flowers for bouquets & edible garnishes.

We’re passionate about creating special experiences around the table, whether that’s through Chef Steven’s special occasion dinners for his clients, or at our long tables under the stars at our public seasonal Kindred Dinners.

We love building and gathering the community at our Kindred Farm Farm Store, which is open every Saturday during the main growing season and 1x a month in the off-season.

What are your plans for the future?
On the farm, I know that I love using as many heirloom seeds as possible to grow crispy greens, flowers for bouquets, tomatoes, cucumbers, and edible flowers for garnish and salves.

I will keep sowing wildflower fields as far as the eye can see for our bee colonies and growing our bee colonies in a natural way this year. We will keep growing storage crops like onions, garlic, and squash that we grow for several months and have one large, fulfilling harvest, so we can then enjoy the literal fruits of our labor all throughout the winter season or around the table at Kindred Dinners.

This year, we’ve started offering Classes, and we will have pop-up breakfasts and flower u-pick days at the Farm Store this summer. We will continue to grow our seasonal Kindred Dinners and are building a new barn to expand some of our offerings here on the farm as well!

The Kindred Life Podcast will continue to release NEW, inspiring episodes each week, both narrative-style and conversations, and I’m looking forward to growing my podcast more this year!

Contact Info:

• Website: http://christinemariebailey.com & http://thekindredfarm.com
• Instagram: @organicstine & @thekindredfarm
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thekindredfarm
• Other: http://christinemariebailey.com/podcast & http://thekindredlifebook.com 

Image Credits
Jeremy Cowart and Christine Marie Bailey