Program

Choos­ing to live in the country as a single person creates a subset of chal­lenges that can seem very over­whelm­ing, but there is hope in patience and per­se­ver­ance! Dr. Cobos will describe both his bless­ings and the chal­lenges met in his journey as he has endeav­ored to create a home san­i­tar­ium out of an aban­doned cabin in the woods, a place he now calls home and where others come for healing.

Why raise animals? What are the best animals for the begin­ner’s home­stead? How can animals help the home­stead? How to prepare for owning animals? We will share our suc­cesses and fail­ures, the good, the bad, and the cuddly!

If you have never heated your home with wood, or are start­ing out and find it chal­leng­ing, this class is for you. We will discuss how and where to get wood, what types are most desir­able, briefly cover chain­saw selec­tion, basic safety prin­ci­ples, and main­te­nance issues, as well as cover other steps you must take before you are finally able to sit at home enjoy­ing the warmth of wood heat.

This class will look at how to start or strengthen one’s exist­ing med­i­c­i­nal herb garden through cus­tomiz­ing herbs which are based on one’s family and neigh­bor’s health needs.

This class will cover the basics of how systems work, types of systems, how to assess your energy needs, system plan­ning, com­po­nents, and bud­get­ing, basic design, how to pur­chase, and basic installation.

In this class we will be learn­ing the basics of pro­duc­ing the purest all natural sweet­en­ers, maple syrup. From the tree to the table, we will cover every aspect and skill set required for making maple syrup includ­ing a busi­ness twist pur­suant of mar­ket­ing capac­i­ties for revenue generation.

Become com­fort­able pre­serv­ing the bounty from your garden! Learn the simple steps to safely pres­sure canning your produce so that you can eat from your garden year-round.

Come expe­ri­ence this hands-on class and learn how to create a rainbow of colors from flowers, berries, and veg­eta­bles. We’ll go over what dye plants you can easily grow in your own garden, and how to easily iden­tify some common dye plants that grow wild. 

Note: Fee only applies to HANDS-ON option. Others may watch demo without paying addi­tional fee.

In this class you’ll learn how gar­den­ing can boost Emo­tional Intel­li­gence (EQ) in chil­dren, gain resources to help engage kids’ EQ, iden­tify char­ac­ter strengths that can be enhanced, and dis­cover the hand model of the brain as a strat­egy for emotion reg­u­la­tion with kids. 

We learned 3 things along the way that we now believe are the most essen­tial details for a begin­ner or someone already on the journey.

Tired of failed seed start­ing exper­i­ments? Come dis­cover tried and true methods of start­ing your own plants that will not only survive, but thrive.

Do you want to give your trans­plants the best start in life? Then say hello to the soil-block! Come learn why this simple, eco­nomic method pro­duces the health­i­est trans­plants around!

Fee only applies to HANDS-ON option (includes a soil blocker to take home). Others may watch demo without paying addi­tional fee.

In this class we will take a broad look at irri­ga­tion options for the home gar­dener — giving the pros and cons for each, and showing hands-on examples.

Are you weeding or are you cul­ti­vat­ing? What’s the dif­fer­ence? Do dan­de­lions tell you some­thing about your soil? Is it pos­si­ble to get rid of morning glory? Learn the answers to these and many more ques­tions as we talk about a chal­lenge that every gar­dener faces: weeds.

Summer har­vests are great, but there’s nothing like cool weather winter crops. Come dis­cover the secrets of extend­ing your season without break­ing your pocketbook.

Healthy soil is a foun­da­tion for a healthy garden and nutri­tious plants. In this class we will learn the basics of how to build, main­tain and improve the soil in your garden for a boun­ti­ful harvest.

Would you like the idea of har­vest­ing fresh food out of your garden every single week of the year? Oh yeah! Come dis­cover how to make this dream a reality.

Which seeds can you save? This class will discuss open-pol­li­nated vs hybrids, pol­li­na­tion, cross-pol­li­na­tion, col­lect­ing seeds, and seed storage. It will include prac­ti­cal how-to infor­ma­tion, sug­ges­tions, and resources.

Farmer’s markets, CSAs, restau­rants, whole­salers, school cafe­te­rias… There are many ways to sell your produce but which one should you do? In this class, we’ll go over what to con­sider for the various busi­ness models that a market farm can adopt and how to find which one (or com­bi­na­tion) is right for you.

How to use tested and tried mar­ket­ing prin­ci­ples to increase the impact and reach of your farm products.

In this class we will look at under­stand­ing all the major weather factors influ­enc­ing your garden — focus­ing on those that you can actu­ally have some control over!

We have all been here. We harvest, beau­ti­ful nutri­tious crops, and a few hours later they look like they are halfway to the compost pile. How do we pre­serve and extend the shelf life of our crops? Come to this seminar to find out.

Growing a market garden is like being a juggler, there are so many balls in the air but how do you handle them all suc­cess­fully? Dis­cover a 3‑step game plan to help you become a pro­fes­sional ​“market gar­dener” juggler.

In this class we will be diving into winter growing, and what it takes to keep a CSA thriv­ing through the winter months.

In this session we will discuss prac­ti­cal ways to make every­day farm and garden tasks more fun and effi­cient using systems like lean man­age­ment, stan­dard­iza­tion etc.

Working full-time, raising a family, being active in church, and growing our farm busi­ness, cer­tainly feels like a jug­gling act most of the time. Come hear some of the things that we have learned along the way and how we fight for balance and main­tain our sanity (mostly).

This low cost crop gen­er­ates good returns as cus­tomers get a whiff of the won­der­ful aroma. This class will cover how to start from seed, prepare the soil, know when to harvest and how to keep the harvest going right through the summer without having to replant. You will also learn tech­niques for effi­cient har­vest­ing and how to keep the bunches fresh looking for several weeks.

This is a begin­ner level class where we will share how we broke into the Micro­green market and how you can get started too.

Every­thing you need to know about growing micro­greens. We will share more tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion in this pre­sen­ta­tion as well as how to deal with pathogens, adver­tis­ing, mar­ket­ing, pack­ag­ing and every­thing else you need to make it a success.

Gourmet mush­rooms are easy to grow and incred­i­bly pro­duc­tive both indoors and out. Dis­cover tech­niques that you can use to trans­form spent organic matter into amazing edible or med­i­c­i­nal mushrooms.

Ginger and Turmeric are not just for trop­i­cal cli­mates, come and learn the secrets for growing these tasty and health­ful crops even if you live in a North­ern growing region.

Want to extend your growing season? This class will cover dif­fer­ent types of hoop houses, growing methods, and ben­e­fits of each to help you choose the best option for you

This class covers the basic prin­ci­ples of growing green­house toma­toes whether you are looking to grow for your own family or for profit.

Have you ever thought about growing Edible Flowers? Edible Flowers have been our second most prof­itable crop when sold along­side Micro­greens. You will learn which flowers are in fact edible and how they can be used, pack­aged and sold amongst other things.

You can cook any­thing in a Dutch oven! Learn how to cook it here and take the knowl­edge home. The sky is the limit — your ances­tors did, and so can you.

In this class we will share our expe­ri­ence with growing, har­vest­ing, dry-storing, selling and main­tain­ing our 1,000 peony plants.

Here we will share with you all the details involved in growing Ranun­cu­lus and Anemones.

God’s ways are all-inclu­sive, designed to affect every part of our lives. The true beauty of God’s plan of edu­ca­tion is dis­cov­ered when it is expe­ri­enced as a lifestyle. This session will prac­ti­cally help parents and teach­ers follow true edu­ca­tion as a way of life.

Explore the ​“why” and ​“how” of engag­ing stu­dents in agri­cul­ture. Unwrap ways to invite the hearts of your stu­dents into the garden to meet their Savior and grow with purpose!

You are one-of-a-kind and no one could pos­si­bly replace you. But if you work at an insti­tu­tional farm, someone will even­tu­ally. Let’s talk about how you can make that process as smooth as pos­si­ble for your insti­tu­tion and how this can even help now with train­ing current staff.

Ready to under­stand how green­house oper­a­tions really work? This class will cover steps and prin­ci­ples to help you opti­mize your green­house and make it a success story! 

Cover crop­ping is one of the easiest and cheap­est ways to build soils, but how do you make it work for you in an effi­cient way? The first hour will focus on all the com­po­nents of a cover crop­ping system and the second hour will focus on devel­op­ing the system — with special empha­sis of no-till cover cropping.

In this class, we will dive into the basics of engine theory (how an engine works) and then use that knowl­edge to teach you how to diag­nose an engine problem. This will be a hands-on course where par­tic­i­pants can learn on real equip­ment like mowers, weed-eaters, chain­saws, etc. Come with cloth­ing that you don’t mind getting dirty!

This is a begin­ners class and will include infor­ma­tion helpful for decid­ing what kind of welder to get for your budget. You will learn about various types of welding and what com­pan­ion tools are nec­es­sary. Safety is of vital impor­tance and will be an inte­gral part of the class. A large part of the 3 hour class will be hands on prac­tice with men­tor­ing to get you started right.

Those who enroll in this class must bring with them:

• a welding helmet, prefer­ably with auto dark­en­ing (brand Miller or Lincoln rec­om­mended as reputable)
• welding gloves
• fully enclosed leather boots with no poly­ester tongue or breath­ing vents
• cotton long loose pants that will go over the boots
• cotton long sleeve shirts
• jacket that can be used around sparks and not melt
• 4¹⁄₂″ angle grinder, cutting discs, flap disc and wire wheel (if you have them please bring them)
• safety glasses are a must!
• You must be 15 and older to take this class

Caleb Dysinger (a micro­green farmer) and his mom, Pam (a farmer’s wife) will open your eyes not only to how ​“mighty” micro­greens are but also how ​“mighty” chil­dren are! They may be small but they are mighty!

Small Group hands-on activ­ity for kids to learn how to cook simple food in a Dutch oven that they can enjoy eating!

Caleb Dysinger (a micro­green farmer) and his mom, Pam (a farmer’s wife) will open your eyes not only to how ​“mighty” micro­greens are but also how ​“mighty” chil­dren are! They may be small but they are mighty!

This option will focus on using smaller boards or one larger board to create cutting boards/​charcuterie boards. Includes adding dec­o­ra­tive inlays and some carving. Student will take home a small chisel, carving tool and mallet and create one board.

This option will focus on using a scroll saw to make signs, orna­ments, or key­chains etc. using a scroll saw. Cost for this tract includes a scroll saw you can take home with you! The goal is to learn how to lay out a make at least one or more of the afore­men­tioned items.

This option will focus on using hand tools to carve and shape wood into a spoon, or other useful items. Student will receive a basic carving tool set, along with some wood blocks, cut resis­tant gloves and strop for sharp­en­ing. The goal is to finish a serving spoon.

In this inter­ac­tive class, we will discover:

• The anatomy of birds 

• How to iden­tify many types of birds with sight and sound

• How to start your own birding hobby

• How to attract ben­e­fi­cial birds, includ­ing a real bird­house example and free plans for some species-spe­cific bird houses

• Free bird iden­ti­fi­ca­tion handout 

• Sur­prise giveaway 🙂

Obe­di­ence as demon­strated by Search and Rescue K‑9s.

In this inter­ac­tive class, we will discover:

• The anatomy of birds 

• How to iden­tify many types of birds with sight and sound

• How to start your own birding hobby

• How to attract ben­e­fi­cial birds, includ­ing a real bird­house example and free plans for some species-spe­cific bird houses

• Free bird iden­ti­fi­ca­tion handout 

• Sur­prise giveaway 🙂

Obe­di­ence as demon­strated by Search and Rescue K‑9s.

Learn more about these fas­ci­nat­ing insects, ​“bee-havior” in nature and hives, ben­e­fits of honey, how they help us, how they see and learn what can we do to help them! And learn how to ​“Bee Not Afraid” of them.

How well do you know your veg­eta­bles? In this class we will be showing chil­dren the wide variety of beau­ti­ful, deli­cious and nutri­tious food God has given us to grow for our enjoy­ment and health.

Learn more about these fas­ci­nat­ing insects, ​“bee-havior” in nature and hives, ben­e­fits of honey, how they help us, how they see and learn what can we do to help them! And learn how to ​“Bee Not Afraid” of them.

How well do you know your veg­eta­bles? In this class we will be showing chil­dren the wide variety of beau­ti­ful, deli­cious and nutri­tious food God has given us to grow for our enjoy­ment and health.

Know your knots!

In this class chil­dren will learn what types of produce grow at dif­fer­ent times of the year and why. Come walk through the growing cal­en­dar and see what fruits and veg­eta­bles grow during the dif­fer­ent seasons.

Know your knots!

In this class chil­dren will learn what types of produce grow at dif­fer­ent times of the year and why. Come walk through the growing cal­en­dar and see what fruits and veg­eta­bles grow during the dif­fer­ent seasons.

Learn what flowers and plants are best for press­ing and which ones don’t work as well! We’ll find flowers around us that we can use in the flower press and do a fun project with pressed flowers!

Lac­er­a­tions, broken bones, CPR, and emer­gency moves/​carries

Lac­er­a­tions, broken bones, CPR, and emer­gency moves/​carries

In this hands-on class you will learn to make fla­vor­ful fun with healthy ingre­di­ents. Easy kid friendly recipes. Share Jesus’ love from your garden and kitchen.

This activ­ity will consist of assem­bling pre-cut pieces to create a basket for har­vest­ing veggies and fruits. Chil­dren will be glueing, sanding and apply­ing a food safe oil to their baskets, and also have the oppor­tu­nity to cus­tomize their project with a family name or drawing. 

Appro­pri­ate for age 5+ with ages 5 – 10 requir­ing someone older to assist.