Beardsley Farm

12/05/2024

..📅✨ The wait is over—it's time for the Beardsley Calendar! ✨📅

Hot off the press, our 2025 Calendar is now available for pre-order! This year’s theme, "Exquisite Co**se," features a stunning collaborative ceramic project by talented Knoxville artists Kendra Barth and Vanessa Hartman—our first-ever ceramic art feature! 🖌️🎨 Both artists are proud Beardsley First Friday art show alums.

This beautiful calendar celebrates community and creativity while including classic Beardsley Farm highlights like our growing guide! 🌱

Don’t miss out on this visual celebration of art and community! Reserve yours today! 🎉 beardsleyfarm.org/2025calendar

Pre-order details (on our website):
📬 Mail Option: Orders ship starting Dec. 16th.
📍 Pickup Option: Calendars will be available at Beardsley Farm starting Dec. 16th.

In store purchases:
✨ Starting Dec. 17th, calendars will also be available at select locations until sold out—stay tuned for details!

**se

12/03/2024

Great news! It's Giving Tuesday. And amidst all the hustle and bustle of the holidays and the the end of the year, we hope you consider supporting our Knoxville community in any way that you can- there's great work happening out here.

Beardsley's School Garden Program provides students with access to nature, lessons about food and gardens, taste tests, and fresh produce to take home. It's clear that this program changes lives. Taste buds are expanding, students have a safe and inclusive space outside, families are cooking together, and the kiddoes are gobbling up sauteed cabbages faster than we can cook them!

Please visit https://www.beardsleyfarm.org/give to donate today. As demand for the program grows, we need extra support and resources so that students can have meaningful time outside, learning about food.

It's been a record year for our School Gardens. We would like to thank , , , , , and for supporting us!

11/29/2024

We greatly appreciate your contributions, and we encourage you to continue giving and reaching out. There is still much to be done to help rebuild communities affected by Hurricane Helene.💜

11/27/2024

We're closed Thursday and Friday for a little break, but we'll be back at it next week. We hope you have a safe and happy weekend, friends! 🍁

11/25/2024

As our volunteer hours come to a close for winter, we thought we'd introduce you to a familiar face around here - everyone meet Mark!

Since June of 2023, Mark has volunteered over 400 hours at Beardsley Farm!! His farming experience ranges from a degree in horticulture, time spent managing a greenhouse, and lots of hours spent in his own community bed right here at Beardsley. Mark moved here from Indiana and immersed himself in the agriculture world by volunteering with us and other community gardens throughout Knoxville. If you have visited us in the last two years you've likely seen him hanging around the chicken coop or trying to solve an ongoing pest issue - he really dislikes those pesky bean beetles!

Mark enjoys how gardening keeps him healthy in hopes he can live to see 100 just like his dad. He also loves meeting new people at the farm who are interested in gardening, animals, and nature. And if you can't tell, he loves a good flannel shirt.

Thank you to Mark and all our volunteers who helped us this year! We will see you again in the spring!

11/22/2024

We’d love to highlight our wonderful partners at Western Heights Boys & Girls Club. We’ve been offering weekly programming to the kids there for the last two years and it's been amazing to see not only the success of the garden but also the growth of the kids and their excitement around being outside, caring for the garden, and trying all the vegetables. We couldn’t do it without support and excitement of their fantastic staff- shout out to Club Director, Linda Fore!

Boys & Girls Clubs of the Tennessee Valley

11/15/2024

Happy Friday! Want to be a Snow Day Superstar this year? Beardsley Farm is seeking business and individual sponsors for 2025's Snow Day Benefit.

Your donation directly impacts our community through access to fresh produce, land for refugee farmers, school garden programming, field trips to the farm, and more.

Email [email protected] for more information on how to be involved!

11/11/2024

Our School Gardens Program has been busy this fall! One popular option they offer is academic lessons on garden-related topics. This lesson was for second grade and combined science standards on heredity with social studies standards on economics. We brought a variety of pumpkins and each student picked one to be their parent pumpkin. We then played a series of games in pairs to figure out which pumpkin won the heredity lottery. They drew pictures of the hybrid "babies", which you can see if you swipe. The lesson then tied specific traits into economic benefits for the farmers or ecosystem benefits for the plants. The classroom teacher said she liked this lesson more than their standard curriculum!

11/08/2024

11/04/2024

It's that time again! Let's take the opportunity to vote and make our opinion matter. See the following link to find where to vote in Knox County.👈🍁
https://www.kgis.org/portal/onlinetools/votinglocationsearch.aspx?portalid=0

11/04/2024

The Knoxville - Knox County Community Action Committee is celebrating its 60th anniversary of serving the community! This special event will be held on Thursday, November 7, from 4-7 PM. See the following link for more information and to RSVP: https://www.knoxcac.org/cac-turns-60/.

Beardsley Farm will be closing at 3:30 that day to help celebrate 60 years of service in our community. We hope to see you there!

❗NOTICE❗: All CAC locations will be closing at 3:30 pm on Thursday, November 7th for a special event. Head Start and CAC Transit will operate on regular schedules. If you are interested in attending our 60th anniversary, please RSVP by no later than November 1st. You can use this link to register https://www.knoxcac.org/cac-turns-60/ or call us at 865-546-3500. 🎉

11/01/2024

We had a wonderful time at our Harvest Festival! Here are some fun moments captured by the talented . Additionally, a big shout-out to for the incredible face painting!

Gracias por venir a nuestro Festival de la Cosecha! Disfruta estas fotos del evento por ! Tambien queremos agradecer a por su talento artistico pintando caras.

10/28/2024

A big thank you to everyone who attended Harvest Fest! We enjoyed delicious food, fantastic entertainment, and lots of fun. Stay tuned for some beautiful images from the day taken by .

We couldn’t have accomplished this without the support of our friends and partners, who helped make this year’s festival one of our best:









All Signs Point North

Hispano
@loricruzephotography




Thank you everyone and see you next time! Don't forget to tag us in your Harvest Fest photos!

10/24/2024

It feels funny to plan a festival in the midst of disaster cleanup. But to not come together as a community to connect and find joy is a shame. We need these moments together to be able to get through the hard times.

While Harvest Festival has and always will be a free event, we normally have a little donation jar out for those able to chip in to help feed our neighbors. This year, all of these monetary donations will go to Helene flood relief efforts.

We will also have flyers up with QR codes to donate directly to the following organizations (swipe or scroll to see organizations chosen by staff and Americorps members).

As always, thanks to our community for supporting the farm and beyond. We're amazed at the power we have together to help those that need a hand.

https://arcd.networkforgood.com/projects/236869-resilient-farmer-fund

https://equalplatesproject.org/

https://www.classy.org/campaign/help-page-girls-impacted-by-hurricane-helene/c624524

https://tnfarmbureau.org/tn-disaster-relief #:~:text=The%20Farm%20and%20Forest%20Families,farmers%20and%20food%20related%20initiatives.

https://secure.qgiv.com/for/rebuildbw

10/23/2024

We're thrilled to share space this Saturday (10/26) with some wonderful friends! Look out for fun crafts, games, and photos from:





and CAC's Head Start!

See you all this Saturday, October 26th from 1-5 for HARVEST FESTIVAL :)

10/20/2024

We're recruiting!

Are you interested in supporting local food access & education in Knoxville's community?

We're looking for a candidate for our Farm and Education Assistant AmeriCorps position. The position runs from January 2025- December 2025.

This is a wonderful opportunity for someone who is enthusiastic about promoting food security and wants a dynamic role on a community farm where they will support both the day-to-day farm operations and educational programming that Beardsley offers to the community.

Find more details about the description and how to apply here: https://cacamericorps.org/opportunities/urban-agriculture-education-assistant/

10/19/2024

We're in for a Harvest Festival TREAT on 10/26! Take a look at the fun coming our way:

Music from:





Face painting from:


And the old Beardsley standbys like:
Needle in a Haystack
Pile-O-Leaves
Ring Toss
Pumpkin Painting
Nature crafts
and more!

Don't forget to come dressed in your costume and get ready to party!

🍁Nuestro Festival de la Cosecha esta lleno de diversion! Tenemos bandas musicales, pintura de cara, diferentes juegos como buscar la aguja en la paja, pila de hojas secas, decoracion de calabazas, manualidades hechas de material natural y mucho mas!

No se te olvide traer tu disfraz favorito!

10/16/2024

Let the countdown begin! Our annual Harvest Festival is just around the corner on October 26th, from 1-5pm at Beardsley Farm. We're getting ready to celebrate the harvest with you in a delicious way:

Chili and greens from
Ice cream from
Cookies from
Kombucha from
Coffee from
..and of course some fun treats for those that find the needle in the hay stack or land the ring on the corn stalk! We hope to see you next Saturday!

La cuenta regresiva comienza! Nuestro Festival de la Cosecha esta a las puertas! Unete a nosotros el sabado 26 de octubre de la 1pm a las 5pm y disfruta deliciosa comida y postres por parte de nuestros patrocinadores (mira los enlaces arriba). Vamos a tener chili con carne y vegetariano, helado, galletas, kombucha y cafe y mas cosas deliciosas cuando participes en las diferentes actividades que tendremos durante el evento. No te lo pierdas, te esperamos!