You know I love me some Mother Earth News, right? It’s been the official publication of simple-living folks and wanna-be simple-living folks since 1970!
Every year, The Mother Earth News people put on the Mother Earth News Fair, which is a giant expo dedicated to urban and rural homesteading and greener, more thoughtful living.
There are hundreds of presentations and demonstrations from experts in, well everything: gardening, permaculture, food preservation, modern home economics, herbal medicine, animal husbandry, solar renovation, off-grid living, raising poultry, green and alternative building techniques, fermentation, farm financing strategies and more.
In fact, my biggest problem with the Mother Earth News Fair is that I inevitably miss presentations I’d love to attend because there are multiple compelling speakers at the same time – there are 14 speaker’s stages this year for goodness sakes!
To simplify the arduous selection process, I do have a few must-see speakers I recommend for new attendees:
Must See Speakers
Joel Salatin is one of the keynote speakers and you must go see him. I’m sure you know him as the “Grassfarmer” in Omnivores Dilemma, and maybe from his own fantastic and fascinating books too. In person, he is like watching a high-energy version, hilarious version of every anti-industrial food rant that’s ever popped into your head.
Jessi Bloom is a local-girl, garden designer and expert on chicken-keeping and systems-based gardening. She wrote what I consider to be one of the essential books on chicken keeping and she’ll be talking about “Easy Peasy Edibles” and how to combine chickens and gardening (“What The Cluck?!”) at the MEN Fair. Great, compelling speaker – make sure to seek her out.
Lisa Kivirist is a pro at combining economics and earth stewardship, both in and out of the home. She has written several books detailing how to move from a corporate life to a considered life. Her latest work is a cookbook inspired by the recipes she uses as the owner of an ecologically-focused Bed & Breakfast in Wisconsin. Last year I was highly impressed with her MEN News presentation “Farmstead Chef: Organic Eating On A Dime” so I’m very happy to see she’ll be doing that presentation again. If you are trying to eat well but your budget is tight, she has excellent tips.
Ira Wallace, owner of Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, has literally traveled the world building up an encyclopedic knowledge of edible plants and seed saving. She gives wonderful, fun and personal-knowledge-backed presentations and has cooler hair than probably any other presenter. She’ll be talking about “Extending The Harvest,” “Seed Starting Simplified” and “Growing Great Garlic.” Pick one or all, you won’t be disappointed. Just remember that her varietal suggestions will be based on her extensive experience growing in the Southeast, so Northwest gardeners may need to adapt the specific varietals.
Meet Up With Me (And My Super Cool Friends) to Chat Sustainability!
At past Mother Earth News Fairs, I’ve been lucky enough to run into readers of this blog and meet some the wonderful people who make up this community. This year, I thought it’d be fun to formalize a get together time.
So, I’ll be hanging out in the food court area (lots of tables) from 2:00 to 3:00 (ish) on Saturday afternoon, drinking coffee and talking to my inspirational friend, simple living expert Lisa Kivirist, about sustainability, women in agriculture, gardening, getting out of corporate servitude*, living a homesteady life and whatever else pops into our heads.
Drop in any time – if you come and join us, we can talk about whatever pops into your head too! Gardening questions? Composting? How to balance kids and jobs and productive homekeeping? Whatever. It’s basically a coffee break.
I know a few other amazing writers and speakers who will be at the fair, and I’m going to try to sweet talk them into joining us, too, if their schedules allow. This could be a really fun group of folks!
All You Need To Know: The Mother Earth News Fair Basics
What – A giant weekend of modern hippie living awesomeness!
Where – Puyallup, WA at the Puyallup Fair Ground
- 110 9th Avenue Southwest
- Puyallup, Wash. 98371
- (map)
When – First weekend in June.
- Saturday June 1st, 9:00 AM-7:00 PM
- Sunday June 2nd, 9:00 AM-6:00 PM
Speakers & Demonstrators – too many to list.
- Full schedule here.
Tickets
- One day (Saturday or Sunday) tickets are $20 if you pre-order and $25 at the gate.
- Weekend tickets (both Saturday and Sunday) are $30 if you pre-order and $35 at the gate.
- Youth 17 and under free. Like, totally, totally free, so bring the kids.
- Or enter the giveaway and maybe you can go for free!
Everything Else – more info here.
Giveaway! Massive Giveaway!
I want as many people as possible to come to the Mother Earth News Fair and soak up this info. And Mother Earth News feels the same way, so they’re sponsoring this giveaway of five (FIVE!) pairs of weekend passes to the Mother Earth News Fair in Puyallup. Each of these five prizes is worth $70!
Each winner will have their two passes left at the will-call pick up window of the Puyallup Fairgrounds under their name.
This is a fantastic giveaway! I ask that you only enter if you are actually able to attend the Mother Earth News Fair in Puyallup, WA on June 1st and/or 2nd. It would be a shame for these free tickets to not get used, so if you live in New York or something and know you can’t fly out for this, please refrain from entering (check out the other locations the MEN Fair will be this year).
To enter to win one pair of free tickets to the Puyallup, WA Mother Earth News Fair, leave a comment below telling me what topic you are most interested in learning about at the Mother Earth News Fair, or which speaker you are most excited to see. Five winners will be picked at random. One entry per person, please. Additional entries will be disqualified.
Contest is open until Sunday, May 19th at 8:00 pm. Winners will be notified on Monday, May 20th by email. Winners must respond to my email by Wednesday, May 22nd at 8:00 pm or their prizes will be forfeited and another winner will be chosen. This is to make sure all winners have appropriate time to make any necessary travel arrangements.
Good luck! Hope to see you at the Fair!
Giveaway is now closed. Congratulations to Deon, Kristina, Nicole, Tanaya and Ginelle. Please check your email for instructions on claiming your prize.
*hat tip to Sarah at Dogs or Dollars for introducing me to the phrase “corporate servitude.”
1
I would love to learn more about organic gardening and backyard composting.
Yea! Back yard composting and organic gardening. This fair sounds so cool! I would love to see some of the cooking sections too. Yum, home made cheese!
Matt Reed, his topic is just beginning beekeeping, but when you take a look at his website, he is into top bar and Warre hives, hard to get info on them, so that’s what I’d like to hear.
Wow- the schedule is packed full of topics that sound very interesting! I see the hardest part is the choice of what to go learn about!! I’m intrigued abut the Food Gardening for Life- No money required: Sounds like a great way to remind myself and maybe teach others about gardening cheaply. Financial Foodshed and the Farming Manual would be great to help with my deep seeded aspirations to have more land to grow food someday. I’d love to learn more about aquaponics, natural building materials, and value-added foods as well. See? Deciding would be the hardest part for sure!!
Would love to attend and see all that is avaliable:)
I’ve never been and I have a lot to learn! I’d love to hear about yogurt, fermenting, pie crust, etc. I’m food motivated. 🙂 Would love to go. Thanks for the chance to win!
Oh please, Oh Please, Oh please. Hubby just found out he actually has the weekend off, Normally he works all weekends. I call it fate. Hubby has been wanting to go for a long while now, but always has to work in the past. We live out of our garden so I would love to see Ira Wallace talk, anything to do with seeds, melts my butter. Thanks, Marcie
I’m really interested in urban backyard composting (small yard) and high intensity vegetable growing including vertical growing and living walls, and extending the growing season with cloches, covers and cold frames.
I started researching chickens, then gardening year round, then got into goats and now looking at beekeeping and permaculture design for my orchard using Bloom’s ideas making a food forest garden with chickens…. so may things I want to learn. I’ve been bouncing around it all because in 6 months I get to move to Nova Scotia, Canada and make our dreams of homesteading possible on 105 acres of family farm. Please, I’d love to absorb more information so I can start doing it right from the beginning!
I would love to attend the fair! I’m a huge Jessi Bloom fan!
There are several dairy goat workshopsI’d really love to attend as we’re seriously considering a couple in the next year or two. Lisa Kivirist’s workshops all look fascinating too. Would love to see those! 🙂
Wow!! Yes, attending would be torture…. so many presentations are simultaneous… can’t do them all! DIY solar panels! natural beekeeping! ducks!!! Lloyd Kahn !!!! and on, and on, and on….. Oh well, if I don’t get there, the schedule will give me endless avenues and authors to explore 😉 Thanks a bunch for being your adorable, hilarious, ingenious, generous self 😉
I would love to learn more about composting and gardening in small spaces (like my tiny urban backyard).
I live in the Puget Sound area and would like to attend the MEN event in Puyallup.
I am interested in chickens and composting, as well as organic seed collection.
I want to learn about beekeeping, keeping goats/sheep for milk (artisinal cheese making), and certainly want to see Joel Salatin in person. He’s my hero! And I’d like to learn about building a small(ish) roadside farm stand.
What a great fair!!! I wish I lived closer I would go in a minute. Enjoy!!
There are lots of great topics on the schedule! We newly transplanted ourselves from Nevada to WA and I’m ready to tackle gardening in our new place, but need lots of info what grows in the NW and tips so I don’t drown everything. Easy Peasy Edibles looks like a good place to start…
I’d like to hear anything about forest gardening and the development of wild edibles int the PNW!!
Thanks
Rick F
Wow, this is so exciting. It’s hard to pick, but I believe that the information on Growing Your Health Independence would be the most relevant to my current personal growth, but they are all amazing! Thank you for bringing my attention to this kick ass event!!!!
I want to learn more about permaculture and extending my harvest. And I would love to meet you! I live inPortland and could definitely go!
I would like to learn more about gardening in a small space and organic cooking on a budget!!
I’m most interested in gardening with chickens and growing some of their food.
This is incredible, we are a family of 11 (4 generations) and have wanted to attend for years…but we were living in Alabama, now we are in Washington and this giveaway….This is great
Picking A topic is hard so really I would have to say the top hive beekeeping would love because have wondered on that and we have just started beekeeping with 2 standard hives this spring.
But I think the number 1 topic would be chickens and gardening because would like free range chickens and have my garden work for all of us, as feeding this group safely, healthily, organically on a budget is crazy if not done at home.
I have gone to the Mother Earth News Fair for the last two years .. I think I could go for the next ten years and not get everthing in! Each year I have had to make hard choices between two seminars .. hourly and I always miss something that I wanted to attend. Well, after two years of attending I MIGHT be able to attend all the seminars I want to but this year I haven’t gotten tickets, it just snuck up on me too fast! So I don’t have a specific person I would like to see or a seminar I would like to attend, I just want to do it ALL! And one of the best options not available before this year? The opportunity to meet up with YOU! 🙂 I’m just in Vancouver, WA so a short couple hours away. 🙂
Would love a pair of tickets. Interested in especially permaculture but would like to learn the latest in solar too!
Thanks for the chance.
Carrie
I definitely have the time free and I’m close enough to attend easily. I’m interested in pretty much anything to do with chickens. I see Joel Salatin has a poultry processing demo on the schedule. That could be quite the learning experience.
Since I still have to work in downtown Seattle, where could I find affordable land with a non-fixer house that I can still commute from? I would like to start building a garden and orchard (and have chickens) to help me in retirement.
oh there is so much i want to learn about, not sure where to start.
Would love to attend this event. Love to learn more about gardening, living off the grid and solar energy. Would love to be able to make my garden more efficient than it is already.
Thank you
Hi! Mavis Butterfield shared your event on her FB page, One Hundred Dollars a Month. It sounds wonderful! I would love to go! I’d especially like to hear Lisa Kivirist and her presentation “Farmstead Chef: Organic Eating On A Dime”.
Thank you!
I want to go so bad!! I’d have a really hard time narrowing down who I’d like to see the most, but how could I not be excited for Joel Salatin?
Would love to be able to take my wife and the little one. Just want to learn more about how to turn our farming dream in to a reality…
I would like to hear Ira Wallace. I have always been interested in collecting and suing seeds from my garden plants, and would greatly enjoy her suggestions. Also, I’ve wanted to do garlic for AGES! My 3 year old daughter has been out helping me in my garden, I think she would love this, too.
I would love to listen to Joel Salatin!
Joel Salatin! This year’s speakers sound amazing.
I am interested in hearing Jessi Bloom talk about “Easy Peasy Edibles”, as I’m researching my future with chickens!
Hopefully I’m in before the deadline. I missed the garden show this year so this would make up for it. Would love to chat gardening with you,
Robin
I’d love to see Joel Salatin!