Valhalla Organics

08/12/2025

Ruby revamped our Pickle Brine Pro Tips and made it into a downloadable, printable PDF!! Now it's easier than ever to get the most out of your pickle jar when all the pickles are gone!

Never throw out pickle juice again: https://www.valhallaorganics.org/get-pickle-brine-guide

03/12/2025

WE FIXED IT!! We've been seeing this meme making the rounds again.... here it is with 100% less problematic messaging!

Get our pickle brine pro tips here - never throw out pickle juice again (you don't have to drink it, but you can!): https://www.valhallaorganics.org/get-pickle-brine-guide

03/12/2025

There are so many amazing things you can do with pickle brine!! We're sharing our five favorite ways to get the most out of your pickle jar when the pickles are all gone.

Sign up for our free guide: https://www.valhallaorganics.org/get-pickle-brine-guide

29/11/2025

We are all set up with a ton of goodies at Academy Center for the Arts in Lynchburg. There are over 20 artists and artisans looking forward to seeing you this Small Business Saturday!

10am-4pm | 600 Main St, Lynchburg

If you can’t make it in person, our website is also stocked up with pickles & preserves (we ship everywhere in the US): http://valhallaorganics.org/menu

07/11/2025

We are thrilled to let you know that Chris had his post-cancer-treatment PET scan last week, and the results were PERFECT!! They did not detect any cancer or anything concerning at all. Woohooooooo!!! 🥰🥰🥰🥳🥳🥳

This is a huge relief, and it means we are able to focus on bringing you the artisan goodies that you crave!!

We did our first production day since Chris started chemotherapy and radiation treatment this summer, and the results were also PERFECT!!

We’ve restocked our best selling Garlic Dill Pickles and Peach Blackberry Jam, plus we have a good selection of spicy and savory pickles for you to enjoy!

13/08/2025

Ruby is so READY FOR IT. Chris, not so much. But guess who runs our social media?! 🧡💚🧡

28/06/2025

This sounds delicious!! Head over to Well Nourished Market in Eden, NC to pick up everything you need!!

Here’s a tasty meal idea for you!

CHICKEN SALAD🥗

Grilled chicken breast with signature seasoning on a bed of mixed lettuce. Toss in some tomatoes, cucumbers, pickled carrots, pickled garlic, hard boiled eggs, and goat cheese. Add in a refreshing coconut lime kombucha!

You can find all these ingredients here at Well Nourished Market and support local! We’re here until 3 today.

11/06/2025

New summer hours for our favorite shop, Well Nourished Market!!

Hello wonderful customers! We have our new hours available for summertime, effective now! We appreciate you all for your support so much and hope these hours work for everyone. As always, feel free to message us with any feedback. Thank you!

02/06/2025

This is so real, friends.

It’s so much worse as a vendor. Ugh.

I love farmers markets but my anxiety does not love them.

20/05/2025

Chris massively rallied yesterday and we made close to 200 jars of pickles. He wasn’t feeling well to begin with, but he insisted on pushing through to get it done. We did spicy, wicked spicy, garlic dill, vampire slayer pickles, and pickled garlic (plus a fruit spread to be announced soon!!). Chris is very ill today so he is resting up.

I’ll put some more info about Chris’ cancer diagnosis and some ways to help in the comments for folks who may not have heard about it.

I added all the pickles that we made yesterday on our website for pre-orders, so they will ship next week. If you’ve been thinking about getting some pickles (and wanting to support us), we would really appreciate if you order some goodies.

Here’s the link: http://valhallaorganics.org/menu

18/05/2025

Chris has Cancer

There's no easy or delicate way to share this kind of news - Chris has been diagnosed with squamous cell metastatic carcinoma (it's a skin cancer that formed a tumor in the lymph nodes in his neck).

The good news is that it's very treatable, it was caught early, and Chris is starting an aggressive course of chemotherapy and radiation.

Obviously there is no good time to receive a cancer diagnosis, but it's particularly difficult for a farmer to endure this intensive treatment during the growing season. During the summer, we grow and preserve the majority of the goodies we sell for the whole year.

This summer, Chris will be undergoing daily radiation and weekly chemotherapy for seven weeks straight, so he is going to be 100% focused on his health.

We are figuring out what that means practically for our farm, but we know we will be producing less than we have in previous years, and we are both pretty anxious about that.

The farm is our sole source of income, so we are reaching out to our community to help us make it through this summer and keep our small business going.

Ways to Help

Right now, we have a small stash of pickles up on our website (including the last jars of chow chow and cowgirl candy from our summer garden). We also listed some of your favorite savory and spicy pickles pre-order (they will ship out the week of May 27th).

Since we may be sold out of some varieties (sweet pickles, sorry!) and sizes, we encourage you to consider purchasing an eGift certificate that you can use when we stock up again. That way, you can help us in this difficult time and still get the pickles that you want!!

A bunch of folks have asked for ways to financially support us without buying pickles (lol I guess everybody doesn't love pickles like we do), so we've included some different ways below.

Please don't give if you're struggling financially yourself - we know times are tough right now and we don't want too put anyone in a more precarious position.

We would appreciate if you could share our fundraising link or share the post about Chris' diagnosis from our page (https://www.facebook.com/ValhallaOrganics/posts/pfbid02uerntCeKAnRvTQV6SQjnCDUoCbR3tXJfrWPTsvtVvf145CbAjVotx5FLfAp4z3p6l) . It really helps to get the word out.

Here's the fundraising link to share: http://valhallaorganics.org/donate

If you'd prefer to donate using a different trusted method, here's our info:

Venmo: Ruby-Reid-2 or venmo.com/Ruby-Reid-2​
If you need the last 4 digits of the phone number: 4491

PayPal: [email protected]

Checks: please make the check out to "Christopher Day" and mail it to 1055 Carlbrook Rd, Vernon Hill, VA 24597.

Thank you for supporting our small farm and our big dreams!

Ruby & Chris | Valhalla Organics

Click here for an update from Valhalla Organics!

15/05/2025

There is no easy way to say this: Chris has cancer. He is starting radiation and chemotherapy soon and his prognosis is good but its going to be a long haul to get there.

Obviously, this isn’t what we were expecting to do this summer, but we are gathering our strength and courage to get through this new challenge, like we always do.

Here are some more details for folks who want to know:

He has squamous cell metastatic carcinoma; it’s a type of skin cancer that moved into the lymph nodes in his neck. The good news is it’s very treatable and it hasn’t spread anywhere else in his body.

He will get radiation every week day for seven weeks and chemotherapy once per week during that time. It’s an aggressive course of treatment with a good success rate.

Chris has been in debilitating pain for the past several months due to the tumor in his neck, and that has been very tough. Most days, it is difficult for him to get out of bed. Once he starts radiation, some of that pain should be relieved as the tumor shrinks but of course he will be experiencing the side effects of treatment at that time too.

There is no good time to get a cancer diagnosis, but the timing is especially bad right now, since summertime is when the farm requires the most attention to grow the crops and make the products for the whole year. I’m not sure how we will navigate that, but I know we will figure something out.

Little Dude (our recently former feral cat) is still working on his bedside manner (he is learning how to “do no harm”), but he is a pretty good nurse all things considered.

A few folks asked how to support us financially, so I just set up a donation page on our website, and of course ordering goodies online helps too! We are sold out of a few things right now, so please consider purchasing a gift certificate to redeem later if we don’t have what you want currently.

We've also got paypal and venmo info below (and info on where to send a check is on the donations page)

https://www.valhallaorganics.org/donate

Venmo: Ruby-Reid-2 or www.venmo.com/Ruby-Reid-2
If you need the last 4 digits of the phone number: 4491

PayPal: [email protected]

Order goodies: http://valhallaorganics.org/menu

Please don't donate if you are struggling financially yourself. We appreciate your kind words, your good thoughts, and perhaps you could share this post - those are all powerful ways to help.