Hello! I’m Christine. Grateful farmer, author, Podcaster, wife, and mama.
I'm a former music industry gal turned social entrepreneur turned author, podcaster, and organic produce farmer. With my chef husband, I’m growing daughters and dreams on Kindred Farm, our 17-acre regenerative farm in Tennessee. Together we grow beautiful food, gather the community at shared meals at long tables under the stars, regenerate the land, and create space for people to experience connection.
I also homeschool my daughters and learn alongside them everyday, which is one of my absolute favorite things.
Listen to my brand new weekly podcast, The Kindred Life Podcast, and join me in exploring how to live more bravely, purposefully, and connected to the tangible experiences that matter most. Available online, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, and more!
You can also check out my debut book, The Kindred Life: Stories and Recipes to Cultivate a Life of Organic Connection, which released in May 2022…
I believe that something magical happens around the table, our souls were made for connection, and life is meant to be shared in community.
My hands feel like sandpaper 98% of the time. I can often be found planting lettuce, making technicolor zinnia bouquets, devouring a great book, exploring with my girls, drinking a coconut milk latté, sharing meals with friends in my kitchen and my backyard, and chasing Tennessee waterfalls with my family.
I believe there’s no such thing as too many flowers, garlands, and twinkle lights and that it’s perfectly fine to be a farmer who also curls her eyelashes.
From my life in suburbia, to the city, to now a sustainable farm, I’m pouring my soul into cultivating a nourishing life of connection, because this is how we were created to live.
And here’s the great news: this is not just something that happens on a farm in Tennessee, but in your suburban neighborhood, your city living room.
Consider this your invitation: you can join me, right where you are.
I’d love for you to…
Listen to a podcast episode and be inspired!
Grab a copy of my book for yourself and a friend!
Join my community - The Kindred Letter - and get a free sneak peak of my audio book - you get to listen to chapter 1! You’ll also get 3 free guides to add more books, plants, and flowers to your life.
Connect with me on Instagram.
Check out the blog.
Try some new recipes.
Contact me directly - I’d love to hear from you!
Check out my original blog, Dreams of Simple Life, where I wrote from 2005-2015. Many of you have been following along since then!
A little more backstory?
I grew up an Italian-American girl in New Jersey before venturing away from the northeast to attend Belmont University in Nashville. During my freshman year, I was known as "the Jersey girl blasting rap music" on our dorm hall but quickly embraced living in the South, woo'ed 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.
In 2005, I moved to Dallas and left the music industry when I was given the unique opportunity to help start an Africa 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, I learned about real food. After seeing the documentary, Food, Inc., in 2009, my husband and I 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, fresh 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. On the first day of spring 2017, we broke ground and began plowing the soil that has become Kindred Farm.
Of all the things I ever thought I'd be, a farmer was never one of them.
But to my surprise, I've found a greater version of my true self while digging my hands into the soil of Kindred Farm.
In my spare time, I love fostering my creativity through ukulele-playing, waterfall-chasing, art, crafts, and photography.