Description

Come experience a weekend away  in the hills of Western North Carolina!

Homestead Weekend: Living the Good Life – Building the family homestead.

Considering a more rural life? Wanting to improve your homesteading skills? Desiring a more self-reliant Catholic community? 

Join us for a Catholic Homesteading Conference located at St. Joseph’s Farm in beautiful Western NC.

       REGISTER HERE for Homestead

Join homesteaders and farmers for a day packed with hands on activities and discussions:

• $495 – Friday/ Saturday (all day)

  Private Consultations/ Round Table Discussions/Land Based Business Coaching  +  Saturday Workshops (Limited to 10)

  Intended for people who are seriously trying to make the transition from an urban life to a more full-time land based way of life. Various scenarios and business models will be discussed as well as the practical logistics and economics that are necessary to make the transition. 

  The discussion and coaching will include but is not be limited to:

  • Choosing where to settle.
  • Setting up your homestead for maximum production & efficiency. (Coming from a Southern/South Eastern perspective)
  • Building New vs Buying Established.
  • Starting a land based business
  • Business Models and ventures based on ease of entry and profitability
  • Marketing, Production, Sales and Self-employment challenges & systems. 
  • Building a Boutique Brand 
  • Capital: Personal Capital, Farm Loans, Friends & Family & Crowd-funding. 
  In addition to the program, a farm-raised Lunch + Dinner will be provided each day for our guests.

    

• $225 – Friday Night Pig Slaughter + Saturday Homesteading Workshops ( Limited to 40)

  The Friday Evening/Saturday Workshop is focused on providing an introduction to a selection of homesteading enterprises and skills and is a great opportunity for people who are still considering if this is the lifestyle they wish to pursue. In addition to the intro to homestead skills their will also be presentations on:

   

  • Urban Homesteading
  • Homesteading on Small-Scale Acreage (3 acres or less)
  • Candle Making
  • Food Preservation
  • Pig Slaughter and Butchery
  • Rotational Grazing on small Scale (10 acres or less) 
  In addition to the program, a farm-raised Lunch + Dinner will be provided for our guests.

   

   

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Father/Son Weekend Overview:

These one-of-a-kind retreat, featuring talks on rites of passage that engage both fathers and sons, will be a weekend of adventure, spiritual formation and prayer.

Included in the weekend will be a traditional pig slaughter and roast, skeet shooting,  and more.   Throughout the weekend, Jason M. Craig, co-founder of Fraternus and author of Leaving Boyhood Behind, will guide participants to a deeper understanding of their relationships as fathers and sons, their identity as men, and provide simple but important principles to strength this bond.  However, the most important part is the experience of the fathers with their sons in natural Christian brotherhood.

• Price covers housing, food, talks, and experiences during the weekend.
• Also included is a copy of Leaving Boyhood Behind.
• Availability is very limited.

NOTE: Two (2) registrations are needed per family. (i.e. 1 per father, 1 per son).  If you bring a second son (3 people total) the third person is only $100.  

       REGISTER HERE for Father/Son

This is an overview, as an element of the unknown is necessary.  Sacraments, including Mass, are not always available on every weekend, so participants should go to confession prior to attending.  Attendees go to the local parish on Sunday if no priest is attending the retreat.

The common prayer is the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary or the Rosary.  If you would like your own copy, purchase the Baronius Press version.

• Friday evening begins with a meatless dinner, introduction and welcome, and then the pig is slaughtered and cooled overnight.  Fathers and sons may arrive as early as noon, but dinner is served between 5-6pm.
• Saturday begins with a breakfast featuring, like all meals, meat and dairy from the farm, followed by a cycle of talks, structured skills-based activities (processing wood, shooting (target or skeet based on ages), and free time with your son.  Throughout the day participants help in the slow-cooking of the pig, which ends with the festivity that only slow-cooked pork can support.
• Sunday is a day of rest and leisure.  Fathers and sons are encouraged to spend this day mostly together, and are free to either go on another adventure in Western, NC, or enjoy the hikes, scenery, and river surrounding the lodge where they stay.  If there is not a priest on the retreat, everyone attends the local parish Mass. (Ordinary and Extraordinary Forms are available within a reasonable distance.)