Nourishing Circles Farmstead

06/06/2026

06/05/2026

This week, I've been sharing the beginning of a story.

A story about Earth Stars.

A story about a blueberry field, a handshake, 3,500 pounds of wild blueberries, and the kitchen experiments that followed.

A story about Metric Farms, the creativity of Mr. Bear, and what became possible when different talents, strengths, and dreams came together around a shared vision.

If you've missed part of the journey, I invite you to go back and read through this week's posts.

Because what I'm building today didn't begin with a business plan.

It began with relationships.

It began with curiosity.

It began with a belief that there had to be another way to support spray-free wild blueberries and the people who steward the land they grow on.

Next week, I'll share the middle of the story.

The harder chapter.

The drought.

The lessons it brought.

The grief it carried.

And the resilience it revealed.

But today, I want to pause and celebrate where we are now.

Because stories like this only survive when communities choose to support them.

Every bottle, every jar, every conversation, every retailer willing to make room on their shelves for local food helps keep farmland in production, supports farm families, strengthens local economies, and creates space for a food system rooted in relationship rather than extraction.

These aren't just products.

They're part of a much bigger story.

A story about Nova Scotia land, Nova Scotia farmers, Nova Scotia families, and the people who choose to keep all of those connections alive.

If you'd like to be part of that story, you can find us at:

• Whistleberry Market, New Glasgow
• Sterling's Farm Market
• Noggins Corner Farm Market, Wolfville
• The New Glasgow Farmers Market through Go West Homestead
• The Tatamagouche Farmers' Market
• The Taproot CSA

Every purchase helps us buy more berries, support more growers, and keep more farmland actively farmed.

And for that, I am deeply grateful.

The story continues next week.

Weaving a collaborative tapestry,

Tawny

06/03/2026

3,500 Pounds

When I first stepped into that blueberry field, I had never harvested wild blueberries before.

I knew I loved them.

I knew I believed in what they represented.

But I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.

What followed was a season of learning.

Learning how to read the field.

Learning how to move with the weather.

Learning that wild blueberries have their own timeline and don't much care about yours.

Learning that farming has a way of humbling you and teaching you at the exact same time.

Bucket by bucket, day by day, the harvest grew.

By the end of the season, we had harvested over 3,500 pounds.

There were sore muscles, berry-stained hands, long days, and more lessons than I could possibly count.

But somewhere along the way, something shifted.

The Earth Stars were no longer just something I admired from a distance.

I had become part of their story.

And they had become part of mine.

Looking back, I thought I was learning how to harvest blueberries.

What I was really learning was how powerful it can be when people, land, and purpose come together around a shared vision.

At the time, I thought we were harvesting berries.

Now I realize we were planting something much bigger.

Weaving a collaborative tapestry,

Tawny

06/01/2026

The Handshake

The next chapter of this story begins with a free online permaculture call.

Among the people attending was a blueberry grower I affectionately call Mr. Bear.

At the time, I knew very little about wild blueberries, but our conversations kept circling back to the same question:

How do we work with the land instead of against it?

Not long after, I found myself standing in a blueberry field looking at a challenge facing many growers.

The berries could be sold into the wholesale market, but doing so would require an insecticide treatment to meet export requirements.

The problem?

The cost of the spray was greater than the value it would add to the crop.

Standing there in that field, neither of us knew exactly what the future looked like.

What we did know was that we didn't want to spray.

So I made a promise.

If he chose not to spray, I would do everything I could to help direct market the berries.

No contracts.

No lawyers.

No business plan.

Just a handshake and a shared belief that there had to be another way.

Looking back now, it seems like such a small moment.

But that handshake would eventually lead to harvests, farmers' markets, recipes, friendships, lessons, heartbreak, and ultimately the path I'm still walking today.

Sometimes the biggest changes in our lives begin with nothing more than a conversation and the courage to say yes.

Weaving a collaborative tapestry,

Tawny

05/31/2026

Why Earth Stars?

Before there was a product, a brand, or even a business plan, there was a field and a growing curiosity about a little blue berry.

The first thing that captured my attention wasn't the fruit itself.

It was the tiny star each berry wears on its crown.

If you've ever looked closely, you'll see it.

A perfect little star, growing low to the earth.

Somewhere between long days in the fields, quiet moments of observation, and a few experiences that are difficult to explain but impossible to ignore, I began calling them Earth Stars.

The name simply stayed.

What began as curiosity slowly became respect.

Then admiration.

Then a deep desire to understand the role these little berries play in Nova Scotia's landscape.

Not just as a crop.

Not just as a commodity.

But as part of a living system that includes the soil beneath our feet, the pollinators moving from flower to flower, the wildlife that depends on these habitats, and the people whose lives are woven together through food and farming.

At the time, I had no idea where that relationship would lead.

I certainly didn't know it would change my life.

But every story has a beginning.

For me, it started with the Earth Stars.

And next, I'll tell you about a free permaculture call, a blueberry field, and a handshake that changed everything.

Weaving a collaborative tapestry,

Tawny

05/31/2026

We’ve been getting lots of questions about the thick layer on top of our milk -so we made this little info sheet to help explain it! 🥛

That creamy layer isn’t spoilage-it’s the cream naturally rising to the top because our milk is not homogenized. We keep things simple and traditional: pasteurized, but left as natural as possible.

We’ll be sharing these with our retailers so customers can better understand what makes our milk different (and why many people say it tastes so much better 😉).

If you see the cream on top… just shake it!

If you’re one of our retailers and would like to display this info sheet in your store to help inform customers about what makes our milk different, let us know and we’ll make sure you get a copy!