#CSAday is February 23. Here are 15 ways we crafted to celebrate and observe this national holiday!
1. Learn about Community Supported Agriculture and find the nearest CSA farm.
2. Cook a meal from scratch using whole fruits and/or vegetables.
3. Make sure you consume your recommended daily allowance of vegetables. 
4. Conduct a produce audit of your refrigerator and count the food miles your food traveled to get to your kitchen.
5. Spend the day taking photos of the nutritious, homecooked meals you prepared and post them on social media with the hashtag #CSAday.
6. Bring in a vegetable dish to share with co-workers at your place of employment.
7. Write your Congressman and ask that she/he support small produce farms.
8. Host a screening of Food Inc, or King Corn, or another food documentary and invite your friends, or arrange to have the films shown on public access TV.
9. Discuss food waste and nutritional mindfulness with your family, friends or co-workers.
10. Encourage your favorite restaurant to buy from their local farmers.
11. Write a letter to the editor announcing CSA Day and tell about how being a CSA member has benefited you.
12. Wear an informative “Eat Local” t-shirt.
13. Give your kids some fun summer activities by planning to attend your CSA farm’s family events!
14. Influence those close to you – Host a National CSA Day party and invite all your food-loving friends.
15. Make a commitment to your family’s health in national solidarity and buy a CSA share from a local farm.
Happy CSA Day!
#communitysupportedagriculture #minnesotagrown #bakersacresfarm#bakersacrescsa #avonmn #certifiedorganic

Dear eaters, 
 
I want to thank you, our Community Supported Agriculture customer, for your support for the farm, and I am writing to invite you back to Bakers’ Acres for our 2018 season! It would be wonderful to see your name on the sign-up list again. I hope you’re looking forward to another season of boxes full of nutritious, delicious, seasonal, hand-picked, fresh-from-our-farm certified organic produce.
 
I am certainly looking forward to hearing all those stories about how the kids gobble up all the grape tomatoes before even getting the box home, or how much folks are enjoying the quality/quantity/variety of the box contents, or the notes of encouragement for our team’s hard work. The social media posts many of you tag with #bakersacrescsa and #bakersacresfarm have been so entertaining and heartwarming – thank you to all of you who share your stories with us about your CSA adventure!
 
The farm is in its 6th year of operation, and we’ve achieved a stabilized production scale. We continue to work hard to make our community a vibrant place to live and raise a family – and you’ve played a critical role in driving this important work. At a time when Big Ag makes monocultured, globalized, and subsidized certified organic produce available for very low prices at the store, it is more important than ever to vote for small diversified family farms with your food dollar to keep little farmers (but BIG environmental stewards) on the land. We know how significant of a choice this is for you.
 
Your commitment to Bakers’ Acres over the last year has made it possible for the farm to:

• Fulfill our annual production and financial business goals, serving 70 CSA families and several small wholesale customers outside of the main CSA season,
• Achieve organic certification three years in a row while building nutrient-dense soils, and maintain our Minnesota Agriculture Water Quality Certification,
• Install Phase 2 of our keyline project to move water on contour and improve soil quality,
• Host several super fun family-focused events with many of you,
• Construct a second hoop house,
• Build a paddock for the animals,
• Add a goat, lambs, and a pony to our barnyard,
• Increase wildlife diversity by transplanting around the farm some trees we planted along the road in 2011,
• Lean up, so we are more resilient, not wasteful with any natural resource, and minimize what we send to the landfill,
• Create a brand new website with a page dedicated to you and your families,
• Bring Sam along with me to New Farmer University in Iowa to learn all sorts of farming knowledge, and
• Attend the National Farmer’s Union women’s conference to learn how I can best lead us farmers when the right opportunity arises.

 
So thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for making this all possible – for enabling me to be the change I want to see in the world, in a way that feels ethical, responsive, compassionate, and hopefully leads by example.
 
As you’ve helped lead this growing movement toward building healthy soils, regenerative agricultural methods (not just sustainable), common sense water management strategies, and a slow food system based on community needs not corporate profits – our commitment to you continues.  
 
This season we plan to:

• Continue providing the large brown boxes filled with everything nutritious and ready to harvest that week, from basil to scallions to tomatoes, cucumbers, raspberries, potatoes, head lettuce, and so much more! We’ve averaged 10 items per box over the last couple of seasons.
• Provide some new tomato colors, raise some food from the Ark of Taste, calculate and share the percentage of organic heirlooms used on the farm, add some new things like ground cherries and tomatillos, expand our pepper production, and help our root crops do a little better this year;
• Bring forth the “community” in CSA once again with the CSA Family Pea Pick in June and the Pumpkin Pick in September, aimed at helping you and your kids see, taste and feel the farm. We’ll again host Sunset Yoga on the Farm around the summer solstice and Tuesday night bonfires!
• Plant the flower garden in the Driveway field, so when you farm pick-ups come, you can pick a bouquet for your dinner tables, self-service.
• Send our members to a Cooking Skills Class led by a local chef expert (Tomas Zimmerman from A.T. the Black & White in Little Falls) so you can all learn along with me and Sam how to make the most of our CSA boxes each week. The class is free, and you have to be a CSA member of one of the area farms to get into it! Stay tuned for registration details.
• Establish some additional perennials like fruit trees;
• Be one of the 12 farms on stage at the Minnesota Cooks event at the State Fair on August 26 (Come see us! It will be fun!);
• Continue using the private Facebook group and “Bakers’ Acres CSA Families” Snapchat feed to strengthen our two-way communication;
• Raise another flock or two of meat birds;
• Plan a new chicken and cover crop rotation to establish some closed-system fertilization and soil-building practices;
• Continue rewarding social media contest winners with colorful new farm apparel, and
• Maybe, just maybe, I’ll be able to provide a bread, cookie and canned goods add-on option to some folks who pick up at the farm, thanks to the new Cottage Foods Law that made it easier to sell from our homes. I know it’s hard to find homemade baked and canned goods around here that use certified organic ingredients, so I’m tossing around some ideas. Send me a note if you think you might be interested in adding on some goodies to your farm pickup!

 
Today, I am asking you to renew your support for our farm. We would love to see you on the sign-up list again. Your CSA purchase is key to helping our farm thrive and prosper, and the funds go right to paying for seeds, fertilizer, boxes, fuel, and supplies for the season.
 
Returning customers – you – can reserve your 2018 CSA share at a discount until February 28: $365 for a Small share (9 boxes / every other week) and $575 for the Large share (18 boxes / every week) with a deposit of $100, or you can pay in full. Prices will return to $375 and $595 on March 1st.
 
Online orders can be made at www.bakersacresfarm.com, or, you can use the enclosed order form. The brochure is a little out of date, so check the up-to-date pick-up locations on our website (we’ve added some).
 
For those of you who already reserved your share, thank you! If you have an open balance, you can mail your remaining payment to the farm or resubmit your order online and pay by credit card.

And speaking of social media contests…here’s a new one for you! For National CSA Day, we’re giving away one of the new “Lettuce Turnip the Beet” zip hoodie sweatshirts with the thumb holes to one winner. Everyone is eligible, even if you renewed your share months ago! To enter: Renew your CSA share on or before National CSA Day, which is February 23, and post on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram that you’re looking forward to The CSA Adventure with Bakers’ Acres. Rules: Make the post public and use the hashtags #bakersacrescsa, #minnesotagrown, and #CSAday, so I can find it when I search for you!
 
If you can’t join us this year, we understand! We know some of you have kids who’ve graduated and you don’t need so much produce anymore, and we know some of you are moving. Feel free to share the enclosed brochure with a neighbor or friend, and, consider rating Bakers’ Acres on Facebook, Google, LocalHarvest, or Yelp and leave feedback about the things you liked during your CSA experience.
 
Once again, thank you for being the support that makes this all possible. Thank you for being eaters who will never let the food system get the better of you and who are the leaders of change. Your support of a Community Supported Agriculture farm inspires people around you, and your support of small, family-run organic farms is important for our livelihoods, communities, our planet’s health, and the places children will play. It was and is my pleasure to serve you and our shared land.
 
Proud to be Your Farmer,
 
Lisa Baker
Farm Manager, Bakers’ Acres

Attending the National Farmers Union women’s conference made me remember one of the top 3 reasons why I started farming: I didn’t like what I saw in our food system, but I only had opinions; I wanted to have a QUALIFIED voice on food/land/ag/farm policy. Experience that I could rely on. "Knowledge" with a capital K. So I began to farm.  

I’d forgotten this while I’ve been in the throes of production, working harder than ever to make ends meet, living in poverty, and letting rural life in Stearns County influence my values a bit differently than it did 15 years ago. Listening to my community and neighbors, hearing the real stories and not just superficial examples, brings understanding, not divisiveness. It’s not about red or blue, it’s about conversations that help us hear what's important to one another. Seeing reality and having boots on the ground (literally) has changed my opinions - in multiple ways. I’ve learned new things about freedom and regulation, and I’ve learned new things about rights. And I’ve acquired new respect for people different from me - different in their values and worldview. By farming - by DOING - I’ve been forming that qualified opinion I wanted, and experience that will speak for me and other farmers for years to come whenever the opportunity serves us. 

I’m asked to run for local office every election season, but I say no every year. I say no to every invitation to board positions. Because right now, I am busy serving in a different way - by putting food on the tables of my community. I still think our food system is messed up, but for now my priority is to "be the change I want to see in the world," and about survival, listening, and getting the lay of the land. Eventually, when I have something new to contribute that will have an impact on our food system, I will. (Thanks, Barb Heen, for that lesson.) At least now I have that qualified opinion I wanted so badly!

My new friends from the National Farmers Union Women's Conference inspire me - these women are so intelligent, hard-working and practical, and more than anything they lift each other up with their shared values in running good businesses and farms, rural organizing for freedom and democracy, and working hard in our lives, electoral politics, and land stewardship. When it comes to being leaders, we're reminded to ask ourselves: If it's not me, then who? 

I'm grateful to the Minnesota Farmers Union for the scholarship that sent me on this week-long adventure in sunny California. My love for farmers and farming just grew even stronger.

@voterunlead #runasyouare #bethechange #farmher #readyreadyreadyreadyreadytorun

Hey CSAers!

​We would love to see you on the sign-up list again this season! Your early CSA purchase goes right to paying for fertilizer, boxes, fuel, supplies, and more, for the 2018 season.

We will continue using the large brown boxes (larger than the boxes we used our first couple of years) – each box is approximately 12x12x12” and, as you already know, filled with everything nutritious that is ready to harvest that week, from basil to scallions to tomatoes, cucumbers, raspberries, potatoes, head lettuce, and so much more! We’ve averaged over 10 items per box over the last couple of seasons.

Returning customers: You can reserve your 2018 CSA share at a discount until February 28th: $365 for a Small share (9 boxes / every other week) and $575 for the Large share (18 boxes / every week) with a deposit of $100.

Online orders can be made at www.bakersacresfarm.com.

To those of you who already reserved your share, thank you! Those early purchases help tremendously as we begin our seed, fertilizer and supplies orders.

Thank you for being the support that makes this all possible. Thank you for being eaters who will never let the food system get the better of you and who are the leaders of change. Your support of a Community Supported Agriculture farm inspires people around you – you are what instills hope in me for a better future. It is my pleasure to serve you and our shared land.

Proud to be your farmer, 

Lisa
​Farm Manager