If I had my life together I would have posted this on Sunday. You know… like.. “The last Sunday Offering of 2020 and it’s a Community Recap”
But… alas… this was me on Sunday…
And I have zero regrets! But I do want to share our 2020 with you. In such a weird year we were able to help more people than we ever have, host more community events than we ever have and love on our neighbors more than we ever have.
In a “normal” year Evan and I would be hauling trailers from here to Austin, Nashville, Marfa… but this year… the pandemic stripped those events from our calendar and left us much more time on the farm. Much more time to do the things we have talked about for so long.
From April to December we masked, we social distanced, we Lysol’d and…
- we hosted 23 outdoor, community events with over 5,000 new visitors to Tate Farms
- we raised more funds in one year for the community than any other year
- we hosted sweet and simple COVID weddings
- we shared our Tate Farms biscuit recipe
- we baked for neighbors
- we baked for our teachers
- we baked against racism
- we encouraged our neighbors
- we said their names
- and we stood up for what we know is right
And we sold a lot of beef! We’d been selling beef to the public prior to COVID and have farmed in Rockwall since 1962 but when store shelves went bare our neighbors remembered we were here.
We went ugly early and rolled out Tate Farms Market Wagon in mid April.
By June it was just about ready and we opened up at the Rockwall Farmers Market.
In the fall, Rockwall Farmers Market ended and we hustled on over to the first year of Staple Goods Market at Standard Service in Heath where we helped put together an awesome line up of some of our favorite vendors…
And finally got Market Wagon just how we wanted it!
We did it all with a little help from our friends…
- our friend Sarah Naylor of Home and Heart Rockwall partnered with us on all of our Drive In movies
- our friend Bree Clarke opened up her markets to us so we could share Tate Farms with friends and customers beyond Rockwall
- and our friends in the media industry helped us spread our message…
Leaning heavy on the Gospel of Matthew… “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” we hope that if that’s the one thing we did this year… that we did it well.
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