Keewaydin Farms is nestled in the rocky, rolling hills of the Driftless between Richland Center and La Farge, Wisconsin. There, Rufus Haucke and Joy Miller are building on this second-generation farm with their own layers of toil, trials and triumph. 

Rufus grew up on this land, and has operated the farm on varying scales and models over the last 15 years, whereas Joy joined him in 2017, and yes—she appears to have brought much joy with her! 

You’ll see that by following their Facebook page. Joy unleashes a range of experiences from their farm life in her creative project, “Dear Farm Journal.” She writes daily posts, always accompanied by multiple pictures and videos that truly look joyful. 

This year, those glimpses of farm activity include exciting developments like a truckload of Purple Cow compost, a new-to-them delivery van, and —most recently— news that they’ve brought on two additional farm workers. 

Joy said some of those investments were possible because of their incredibly popular CSA shares so far this year. “Our CSA has been going crazy,” she exclaimed.

Due to social distancing and concern about shopping in public markets, CSA programs have been thriving this spring, and like many local farms, their shares are selling out. Spring sold out early, and summer is now sold out as well, including the additional 50 shares they added. Their website even crashed a couple times.

Half-hog shares and egg shares sold out, so they arranged for more stock to scale up, including twice as many chickens. They’re still taking sign-ups for their fall and winter program, though— which runs through December 9th. They’re also starting to use an online sales platform that will allow people to order items without being a CSA member, and because they hired someone to do deliveries,