The Story Of Nature's Pantry

For those of you who don’t know the story, I grew up on a “regular” dairy farm - the same farm we live on today.  

We milked 60 cows twice a day, 365 days a year, for 35 years. Talk about a commitment.

The farm was a great place to grow up. There was always something to do and it was a great place to build a strong work ethic. My brother, sister, and I were required to help with chores on a daily basis. But then the time came and we started to leave for college. This left a ton of work for my parents. However, they muddled through and kept-on-a- farmin’.

My dad’s health suddenly took a turn for the worse. After kneeling on a cement slab for far too long, he ended up injuring his knee so badly he had to have surgery.  The surgery went fine, but it’s hard to operate a farm on crutches for 6 weeks. (I think he made it about 3 days with his crutches. You can imagine how well it healed.)

After years of struggling through unfair milk prices, more work than they knew what to do with, and a body that wouldn’t cooperate, they knew they had to sell the cows.

The cows were loaded and sold and my parents said goodbye to the only life they ever knew.  

There was a lot of uncertainty. How would they pay their bills? Where would my dad get a job at 55 years old? What would happen to the farm that’s been in our family for 6 generations?  

I can’t even imagine how overwhelmed they felt.

This was 2010, the year I graduated from Winona State University with my RN degree and married the best farmer in the world. (who wasn’t actually a farmer at the time - he was a powerline man and a total city slicker!)  

Unbeknown to us, with all the free-time my dad suddenly had, he had his nose buried in books trying to figure out the answer to the question of “why is everybody so sick?”. And boy did he find answers.

Through his research he came to the conclusion that a large part of why everyone is in such poor health is because of the foods we’re eating.  He learned about the dangers of GMOs, the harm we’re doing to the environment with the onslaught of chemicals we’re spraying on our crops, how deficient in nutrients our foods actually are today, and how our bodies are not designed to eat processed foods.

Just follow the food pyramid for optimal health, right? Ehhh, we tend to think a little differently now.

On a positive note, he also uncovered the incredible health benefits of pastured meat and dairy and how eating clean, organic, wholesome foods could actually help people heal from disease and prevent so many from occurring.

 He kept all this information secret while we continued to live a "normal" life. It wasn’t for another year or so that he shared this information with any of us which just happened to be the same time we were having our first child.  

Anyone who has a child knows they change you forever. The unconditional love you have for them is so powerful and it can’t be summed up by words. Knowing what I know now, I refuse to feed my children GMO, conventionally raised foods that have been tainted with cancer causing chemicals.  

Call me crazy. I don’t care.  

As a mother, it’s my duty to keep my children safe and healthy and I believe that the foods we eat every day play a crucial role in making that happen.

And so, our plans changed. We left our comfortable life in town and moved to the farm (which BTW, when I turned 18 I promised to never return!)

I won’t bore you with details, but what started out as raising food for our family has blossomed into Nature’s Pantry and we now provide food to over 250 families.  We produce grass-fed beef, pastured pork & chicken, pastured eggs, raw grass-fed milk & yogurt, and raw honey.

There is no turning back for us. We're here to provide our family and community with real, pasture raised, nutritious food because we believe this is the foundation for true health.  We’ve put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into this farm and have accomplished a complete 180 with our farming practices.  We will no longer contribute to the death of humanity and the earth through poor farming practices.

 So that’s our story and we’re stickin’ to it.

The choices we make are powerful. Collectively we have the power to create a vibrant and healthy planet for our children. 

Romans 12:21: "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good."