Meet Kristi from The Kallio Farmhouse

Hello, I’m Kristi!

First things first, welcome to The Kallio Farmhouse! Thank you so much for taking the time to learn what we are all about! I couldn’t be more thankful to have you! So as long as ya’ll keep showing up, I will be here sharing, all the garden things, natural living tips, delicious from scratch recipes, a touch of our homeschool journey and more! The only way you will for sure never miss out is by joining our email list!

Welcome to The Kallio Farmhouse where I passionately share things like, sourdough recipes, garden to table food “how to’s” and our family’s simple life.

My husband Ryan, and I live in a small town in Central Oregon with our two kiddos. Our seven year old daughter, Harlin and son Noah who is four. We moved into our very first home in 2020 and started creating our dream of living a more sustainable lifestyle.

If you would have told me or my husband that we would be living this lifestyle we are living today, I think we both would have laughed. Before I had children I never thought about living sustainably or how I wanted my kids to grow up.

But now my dream is to teach my kids to love living a simple life, that a big chunk of their food comes from our family garden in the back yard, that our meat comes from a farmer down the street and that animals sometimes are the best of friends. I want my kids to be free and play in the dirt using their imagination for hours on end. That they can go to the garden, grab an assortment of fruits and vegetables and come up with a delicious wholesome snack!

I hope to inspire you to do the same. You don’t need a huge plot of land, or large gardens. You just need the courage to be different and the willingness to dive in and try!

How I got started on my journey

In 2019 I stumbled across a blog about sourdough and was instantly intrigued. Afterwards I immediately started researching and reading anything I could find. Well, that all led into learning about gardening, fermenting, homeschooling and all together living this simple lifestyle that grabbed all of my attention. I was completely hooked!

And before you know it we built our own garden beds and got our first set of chickens in spring of 2021! Come follow along with our family’s daily life over on my instagram page.

When it comes to the things I am passionate about I basically dive in head first! I truly believe that anyone can learn these skills that I have spent the last handful of years learning and slowly but surely live a simple and sustainable life.

About me

I am a total health nut (a majority of the time!) At any given moment you will find at least two or three things fermenting on my counter in the kitchen. I love making all the sourdough things, and anything fermented or pickled! To be honest my husband is more of the chef in the family! And of course mama is the baker!

When it comes to being a health nut, I used to be one in a completely different way. In my early 20’s I was solely focused on being “skinny” not being healthy. I did many fad diets to achieve the goal of looking a certain way. As I’ve gotten older I have grown in my understanding of health and what I believe our bodies need to be nourished, like eating all the colorful fruits and vegetables, locally grown organic meats, and an array of fermented foods. I truly could nerd out about this subject all day!

I also love having an assortment of natural remedies in my home and I love continuing to learn about all the herbal remedies out there. My goal is to grow all my herbs to always have on hand.

So if you like growing plants, baking all the sourdough things, preserving your hard work from the garden or just simply talking about homeschooling, I think we should be friends!

Before The Kallio Farmhouse..

Though I always dreamed of living on a farm as a little girl, I grew up in a very suburban neighborhood. We did not live in a sustainable way. We didn’t garden or preserve foods, I wasn’t homeschooled and nor did my mom have a desire to homeschool my brother and I. Therefor I was starting this journey completely from scratch. Although I didn’t have this knowledge passed down to me, I feel like I have gained so much from having to learn on my own and be self taught.

That is the main driving force in creating The Kallio Farmhouse, I wanted to help people like me that are starting out with zero information and give them the confidence to keep pushing and learning how to live this “not normal” but undoubtedly special, simple life.

Despite most of my family thinking I am crazy for choosing to, in their words “work harder” than necessary, I absolutely love the life we live. I am so thankful God chose this path for my family and me.

Speaking of family, similarly my husband did not grow up living this lifestyle. So this was all new to him as well. Although this wasn’t what he had ever pictured when he thought of his future, he has stepped up and become my biggest cheerleader and supporter! We have learned and grown together and let me tell ya, I could not be more thankful.

A few fun facts about me

Anything crafty… Sewing, knitting, drawing count me in! If you left me home alone for the day you’d come home to find a mess of my projects scattered around the house.

I am undoubtedly a home body. If you didn’t find me in a pile of crafts, you would otherwise find me curled up on the couch with a book and a cup of coffee or glass of kombucha in hand. I absolutely love to read and could keep my face buried in a book for hours. Though I do enjoy reading to learn I equally enjoy reading just for pleasure. I am most definitely a coffee lover, always have been always will be. But recently I am finding my love for kombucha!

For as long as I can remember I have been called an old soul. I can remember as a young girl people telling my mom just that whenever they would meet me. Along with that I have also been called an old lady my entire life! It’s 100% true and I love it! Can I get an amen to all my old lady friends out there!

Happiness to me is really so simple, The first cup of coffee in the morning, laughter from your kids, the warmth of the sunshine on your skin, the kindness of a stranger, sounds from the garden, the first bloom in spring to the last leaf in the fall, the book you can’t put down, the smell of fresh bread baking. I believe it is the little things in life that we typically tend to skip over that are the most important. I hope this becomes a place of happiness for you, a place of learning and a place of connecting with us fellow people!

Thank you for taking the time to get to know me a little better!

Brand new to The Kallio Farmhouse blog? Get some of my most popular content here:

• Seed Starting 101: A seed sowing guide for beginners.
• How To Maintain And Feed A Sourdough Starter