After receiving a slew of cow-themed presents for her marriage ceremony in 2012, Ashley Kennedy had a realization.

“Is that each one individuals consider me?” She thought. “Do individuals suppose that is the one factor I like? As a result of I like much more than simply cows.”

Do not get her improper – the dairy farmer from Unhealthy Axe, Michigan loves cows, and she or he loves her cow-themed presents. However she additionally loves books, podcasts, working and writing. This realization made her rethink the angle of her weblog referred to as Dairy Innovation.

“It made me suppose that if I might write about different issues, possibly I might join extra with individuals outdoors of farmers, which was my complete objective,” she says. “That is once I switched from Dairy Innovation to Messy Kennedy.”

Messy Kennedy (Messykennedy.com) extra precisely displays who Kennedy is in the present day: a mom, a dairy farmer, a prepare dinner, and extra.

“My objective is to succeed in out to a mother like me — a busy, working mother who cares about what she’s feeding her children and household, as a result of I am that mother, too,” she says.

The title comes from a pal of Kennedy’s who all the time thought “Ashley Kennedy” sounded a bit like “Messy Kennedy”. Additionally, “I am like a strolling sizzling mess all of the time,” laughs Kennedy.

weblog improvement

That is the third iteration of Kennedy’s weblog. She began the primary model – The Scoop – in faculty.

As then Michigan Dairy Ambassador, one in every of Kennedy’s mentors advisable that she begin a weblog to share her insights into the dairy business and touch upon sizzling matters. “I beloved to write down, so I fell in love with running a blog and I have been at it ever since,” she says.

After faculty got here Dairy Innovation with a concentrate on technical info. On the time, Kennedy was working within the dairy business, however she hadn’t discovered her means again to the farm but.

“I missed my dwelling and the farm and knew I wished to come back dwelling sometime,” she says.

In 2011, Kennedy started milking cows for minimal wage on her dad and mom’ dairy farm. Since then, Kennedy and her husband Eric have been engaged on a plan to buy the farm. They formally purchased the enterprise in the summertime of 2017.

“If we might see into the longer term, we might have waited one other yr, as a result of who takes over a farm when milk costs are at all-time low?” She asks. “However my husband and I hold saying, ‘If we are able to get by this, we are able to get by something.'” The farm has 240 cows with 4 robotic milking techniques.

Suggestions for Freshmen

“Discover out what viewers you wish to attain,” advises Kennedy. “In case your objective is to shake arms and speak about issues outdoors of agriculture, then technique might be required.”

For Kennedy, which means interested by every put up and contemplating whether or not or not a non-farming mom would wish to learn it.

For farmers who simply wish to share what they do each day and are not working to succeed in a bigger viewers, Kennedy says, simply do it. She additionally does not need farmers to underestimate her attain amongst household and buddies.

“If you happen to simply share in your private social media, you may be that farming useful resource for 200 individuals,” she says. “You too can obtain rather a lot that means.”