Back at it

After a long hiatus, I’m back at it. I’ve been working on a few side projects, but I’m ready to get back to writing and building.

Twenty-twenty-five was a big year for our family. We had a new baby, moved into a new house (back in the country), and I started a new job (technically last December).

On the home front, our new little homestead is a throwback to Ragtime Ranch. The new house has given me a lot of work to keep me busy, in addition to getting our old house ready to sell. But most of the hard (and expensive) work has been done, and I’m looking forward to getting back into homesteading. We’ve already got our little layer flock, and we’re planning to add goats, pigs, sheep, and bees. The kids are excited to have a larger vegitable garden, and I had the brilliant idea to make the garden a temporary “sandbox”, so the kids have been busy digging up our future garden. Hopefully I’ll be able to get them to stop digging in it when the time comes to plant.

MemberDrive.org has admittedly been in maintenance mode, but I’ve managed to keep it running and improving, and even added some key new features, most notably the ability to accept Bitcoin donations. I’ve got some exciting new features in the works for 2026:

• Member-driven fundraising campaigns
• Donor-initiated matching gifts
• More payment integrations

Of course, marketing has suffered a bit, so that will also be a focus for 2026, as well as building my personal brand. Although I’ve tried some automated marketing campaigns, I’ve found that the best way to grow is to share and engage personally, rather than relying on algorithms. I’ll be opening up a bit more here on my blog, as well as posting more on LinkedIn. I’ve also gotten back on X @farmerheneise and plan to be more active there as well.

Self-censorship has always been an issue for me, so posting publicly is a bit of a challenge. There’s so much content and noise out there, but speaking for myself, I enjoy reading other people’s personal experiences, so I hope you’ll enjoy reading some of mine.