Homesteading, which is the practice of living as self-sufficiently as possible, especially by growing food, is trending online. Yet, it can be hard to tell which influencers are authentically living this lifestyle. For the Coveys, this lifestyle isn’t a filtered facade.
The Covey family consists of Ellen and Isaiah Covey and their six daughters: Gracie, 12; Emma, 9; Rosie, 7; Alice, 5; Marigold, 2; and Beatrice, 7 months. The couple met when they were 11 years old, got married at 19, and had their first daughter at 21.
Together, the couple homesteads and homeschools in rural Hartville on their 17-acre property, which is home to a large garden, 10 sheep, 30 chickens, two calves, four dogs, and three cats. Ellen, the matriarch of the family, has about 25,000 followers on Instagram. On the platform, she has racked up more than half-a-million views on a video of her revealing the gender of their youngest daughter, Beatrice, whom Ellen gave birth to at home. Despite having posts of glowing photographs and viral videos, when the cameras are put aside, the family actually lives the homestead lifestyle.
The family originally moved to Tennessee from California in 2021. Due to a slightly higher cost of living in Tennessee, the family decided to change their lifestyle in 2024, purchasing a homestead and moving to Missouri.
Isaiah had dreamed of homesteading and took classes and studied in his free time on how to take care of farm animals, while Ellen posted about her daily life on social media, enjoying living in their four-bedroom, five-bathroom house in Tennessee that had no farm land. While Ellen had already been homeschooling all of her children and home birthed most of them, she had never homesteaded.
Ellen and Isaiah considered what type of lifestyle they wanted and ultimately decided to move to rural Missouri. A large contributing factor to their decision to switch to a homesteading lifestyle was the covid-19 pandemic. “It is a very helpless and vulnerable feeling, not having animals or a garden,” Ellen says. “We had a family, and I was not wanting to rely on grocery stores.”
Now, Isaiah works for a local manufacturing company as a safety manager to provide for the family and their homesteading endeavors, while they live in a two-bedroom, one-bathroom cottage.
Behind Ellen’s viral videos is a mother with a more than full-time job of cooking, cleaning, and managing her home each day. Look behind the curtain of social media and view unfiltered photo- graphs of their homestead life.
Ellen has breastfed each of her children, the longest time consecutive breastfeeding being 26 months. While breastfeeding Marigold, she had mastitis, or an infection of the breast tissue, 12 times.
The sound of bluegrass influences the hymns they play. They came to love bluegrass when they lived in Tennessee before moving to Missouri.
• Ellen says she isn’t sure if they will have more children, but “just saying ‘no’ to carrying more babies is not possible,” Ellen says. “It is such a miracle and blessing, which we sometimes take for granted.” Before the birth of Marigold and Beatrice, Ellen had seven miscarriages, including a set of twins, due to a blood-clotting disorder. “After our pregnancy losses we realized that we may never be given another healthy baby again. God may bless us with more children. We are trusting God with how many babies we are given or not given,” she says.
To sustain this lifestyle, Ellen and her six daughters work as a well-oiled machine. On their fridge is a detailed, color-coded schedule that includes the chores each child needs to complete, the school subjects they need to study, and when they have free time. This family teamwork mindset helps Ellen juggle house and family management. “I don’t really do the dishes or clean up meals. That way, I have time [to do other chores] in between things,” Ellen says. “I am always moving.”
The girls don’t have a typical summer vacation; their school break is determined by the gardening season, when Ellen was focused on gardening. Their schedule has also been affected by Ellen’s first trimester of pregnancy. “The first trimester is when everything gets difficult,” Ellen says. “We prepare by stocking the freezer and such.”
• Ellen suggests when starting a homestead to “not buy all the animals and the biggest garden or you will overdo it and get burnt out.” She says the best course of action is to slowly add different plants and animals as time goes on.
The Covey family has a traditional washer but hangs their clothing to dry. This helps Ellen have “more of a reason to go outside,” she says. Ellen makes many of the girls’ clothes by hand.
Ellen planted lamb’s ear, pictured here, after her third miscarriage. She chose this plant because the texture and name of the plant reminded her of newborns. “Newborn’s ears are fuzzy like a lamb,” she says. She transported the plant from Tennessee to Missouri.
Rosie, left, and Marigold watch with interest as a stranger turns around in their home’s gravel driveway.
This article was originally printed in the June 2026 issue of Missouri Life.
All photos by Andrea Kaneko.
