Welcome to my new blog!

Hello, my name is Amanda and I am the owner of Mommas Batty Barn. I have run this business for over 3 years now and it has been quite the journey.

If you didn’t know already I own a small homestead in the small town of Penrose, Colorado where I am blessed to stay at home to homeschool my 4 children. We have multiple animals including ducks, geese, chickens, pigs and my famous goats that I milk to make my bath and body products!

Life has hit us hard this year but at the same time a lot of blessings and new opportunities. That seems to be the same with everyone in 2024. It has forced me to really consider what my plans and goals are for my business.

Why am I starting a blog? Well, to start, I realized I started to not enjoy having to constantly fill products and then run all over to restock. May not seem like a lot but when you have to take care of a farm (and so much more) and have to take all 4 children with you everywhere it can become taxing! It also was sucking all my extra time I had that I truly needed to be with family. That made me have to make the decision to slow down, back out of some of my vendor locations out of my town and keep it simple. That already made me feel a sense of relief. When I have to restock product, I had to make enough to stock 5 different locations and that is ALOT. Then having to take all my kids and products and restock anywhere and everywhere while also trying to run my normal errands for our farm and family was exhausting!

I was also finding that as my kids get older, their education requires more of my time which in turn means less time to spend on advertising, events, restocking, etc.

God has blessed me with the opportunity to join the Penrose Park board as their program coordinator and I have had the pleasure of helping to coordinate many new family programs this year. I am having so much fun with this and realized how much I truly enjoy organizing events and helping my community. I look forward to all the future brings with this opportunity but it was something else I added to my plate this year.

With the blessing of new opportunities, came some hardships. The farm has been very taxing this year with so many problems with the goat kidding this spring, non stop problems in the garden, new baby pigs, etc. I was trying to keep my business going while also trying to keep my animals and garden alive as well as take care of my family.

My health has taken a hit in the last 6 years with stomach ulcers and after what felt like the millionth time in the ER recently from them I think I finally got hit hard enough to realize that I needed to finally take the time to take charge of my health.

With all that being said, I took quite some time to really pray and see where God was leading me in my life and what direction I wanted to go with my business (along with everything else). It has been a blessing the past years helping to support our family when we needed the extra money to get by but I finally came to conclusion that I needed to shift my priorities back to my local town so I have more time for my family, self and farm. I knew if I refocused back to that, God would provide as He always has and I could focus my time on making it by with what we had. I have always been an overachiever, go getter and busy body so I easily took on more than I could chew with my business especially since it was starting to take off. I always had my families support with my business and for that I am extremely grateful.

I don’t know how many of you homestead but that in of itself is a full time job and add homeschooling to the mix and you have a full plate! As my business grew, kids grew and my homestead grew, growing a business because more taxing.

With all that being said, I wasn’t ready to let go of my business and didn’t feel like that is what I needed to do. I do love making products, going to events, etc but I needed to bring it back to just local so I could more easily manage it. I am extremely grateful for everyone who has supported me and grown me these past couple years and I wish I could continue to grow and spread my wings outside of Penrose but that is just not something I can do in this season of my life. I am thankful to be apart of Bugling Elk Winery and Penrose Community Library and will continue to offer my products at these locations!

Blogging has always been something I wanted to do but didn’t ever pursue it. It then occurred to me that this might be the perfect opportunity to start one! I can share stories from my everyday life at the Batty Barn, my failures and successes in different areas of homesteading and homeschooling, recipes, how to’s, encouragement and so forth. I want to combine my love for helping people and passion for writing into my business in the hopes I can help encourage those who are on the same journey and entertain those who aren’t. They might be short, messy, random, etc but I don’t plan on it being perfect. It’s just me sharing my ups, downs, lessons, stories and tips and tricks with you through this busy season in my life, so enjoy!

Like I said earlier, I am not ending my business just bringing it back to my town. I just ask for patience as time to restock will come as I can find time.

Same goes for my sourdough, I will continue to bake through this summer at the local markets and then I’ll be baking as I have time which will be available by either pre order or for local pickup at the library. I also hope to plan some sourdough classes for next year. Like me on instagram and Facebook to stay up to date with all of that.

I also want to start doing other classes including soap making classes, cheese making classes, etc so be on the lookout for those, hopefully by next year! I have immensely enjoyed the goat yogas so I plan on continuing to put those together every year!

So there you have it, a short backstory into my life this past year and what has driven me to the decisions I have made about the future of my business.

I can’t wait to continue writing and sharing so much with you!

“Blessed be the Lord, for He has heard the voice of my pleas for mercy, The Lord is my strength and my shield; in Him my heart trusts, and I am helped; my heart exalts, and with my song I give thanks to Him.” -Psalm 28:6-7