Years before the crowds, the farm stand and the national attention, Ballerina Farm founders Hannah and Daniel Neeleman were visiting small agricultural communities and imagining what kind of place they hoped to build in Utah.
They would eat at farm dinners, community gardens and local markets, and picture something similar taking shape on their own land — not just a working farm, but a gathering place.
Now, after nearly a decade of building Ballerina Farm from the ground up, the Neelemans say that vision is materializing. With the opening of their Kamas farm stand last year and the addition of a market garden in the fall, they now have a robust slate of opportunities to put on community events. So, that’s what they’ve done.
This spring and summer, the farm will host several new community-focused experiences, including a free Spring Days festival in June and a farm-to-table dinner with Ballet West in July. The events are part of a broader agritourism effort that Hannah says has become one of the most rewarding chapters in the farm’s growth.
“Daniel and I have been dreaming about an ag-tourism experience, something that involves the whole community, since the very beginning. … In a world where a lot of things are online and very two-dimensional, we felt like this was the goal,” she said. “It’s taken us eight years to get to a place where we feel like we’re able to do that.”
And it’s not just one-off events, but annual, seasonal gatherings that drive the farm’s calendar, Hannah said.
“Daniel and I and the team, we just love the idea of traditions. Like, ‘every spring I go to this spring fest, and I can get this specific ice cream or this specific pastry, and the kids can do this thing,’” she said. “We had that growing up in certain things, and we want to be able to offer that to families in the community.”
For Hannah, whose social media storytelling has drawn millions of followers to Ballerina Farm’s blend of farm life and homemaking, the events are ultimately about fostering in-person connections, both to others and to the land.
“There is a bit of a void in Utah, especially, where we’re disconnected from the food that we eat and the food that we buy from where it grows, and so we want to offer that to the Utah community,” she said. “I feel like the work definitely found Daniel and I, and it came to us in a way that we’re like, ‘This is our mission. This is our calling.’ … I think just feeding your community is just such a noble, beautiful thing.”
Not only do events give people an opportunity to see the animals and produce firsthand, Hannah said, they’re also a kind of “third space” that isn’t home or work. She recalled driving over to the farm stand the morning of their first festival event last fall and seeing a row of cars arriving.
“I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, there are so many people here,’ and it was everyone from our church, everyone from the kids’ teams. It was literally our community showing up,” she said. “It was so cool, such a full-circle moment for us, and I was like, ‘OK, it’s worth all the blood, sweat and tears.’”
Since then, seasonal events at the farm have steadily expanded. A winter market featuring carolers, children’s activities and a Christmas tree lot drew large crowds during the holidays and showed the community was eager to gather around agriculture and local food.
The next in the seasonal series is Spring Days on June 5 and 6, a free celebration of the beginning of the agricultural season. The festival will include greenhouse tours, newborn farm animals, fresh food, children’s games and even opportunities for guests to purchase baby chicks and begin backyard flocks of their own.
Hannah said the Ballerina Farm team is always looking for ways that entire families can feel comfortable spending time together — something she believes is often missing from many farm-to-table or culinary events.
“One of the most fun parts about these events is, OK, how do we involve the kids?” she said. “I love going into places like a store, and if they have a little activity for my kids to do. … I feel like that’s been something that we’ve run into as we’re traveling, and we’re going to different farms, or farm-to-table things or community events, where it’s an amazing event, but it wasn’t a place for children.”
That philosophy influences nearly every aspect of the farm’s planning process, from hands-on activities for children to long-term infrastructure ideas still in development.
“One of the things we’re really excited about for the long-term play of the Kamas property is a playground, but really in a thoughtful, farm-centered way,” Hannah said.
And her own nine kids have plenty of say in dreaming that up, she said.
“Whenever we go travel anywhere, and they have a cool playground, the kids are like, ‘Mom, this is what needs to come back to Kamas,’” she said.
That’s ultimately what the agritourism vision is all about for the Neelemans: bringing people back to the Kamas farm. Neither Hannah nor Daniel grew up on farms, and she said both have learned through years of trial and error while building Ballerina Farm.
“I’m grateful for the background that I had, and I’m grateful for the background that Daniel had, because they are helping us in the business aspect and the storytelling,” she said, admitting with a laugh, “All the time, Daniel and I are like, ‘Oh, if we were to have been raised on a farm, we would have made a lot less mistakes.’”
Still, she said, agriculture has provided lessons in responsibility that she values deeply for their children. She said those responsibilities — like her boys’ job of giving baby calves their bottles — create a unique sense of purpose.
“These animals depend on us, and so it teaches them an enormous amount of responsibility and then satisfaction in return,” she said. “It’s the same with Daniel and I, too, when we’re able to sit there and watch the animals eat, or whatever it is, you just feel the sense of satisfaction that I feel like you don’t get outside of agriculture. It’s really cool to raise a family in that setting. Neither Daniel and I were raised that way, so I don’t think it’s the only way to raise children, but it is really good.”
The farm’s next major event after Spring Days will bring together another defining part of Hannah’s background: ballet.
On July 15, Ballerina Farm will host “From Root to Relevé,” a large-scale outdoor dinner in partnership with Ballet West as part of the company’s inaugural Summit Festival programming.
Hannah, a former Juilliard-trained ballerina whose daughters now dance with Ballet West Academy, said the collaboration immediately felt aligned with the farm’s identity.
The idea originated with Ballet West Academy director Allison DeBona, who approached the couple about staging a farm dinner alongside a live ballet performance in the pasture.
The evening, held along the creek in the pasture by the Neelemans’ homestead, will feature a meal prepared by guest chef Micheál “Tiffin” Griffin from Ireland and Ballerina Farm chef Avery Jensen using ingredients sourced directly from the farm, including produce, meats and cheeses. Ballet West dancers will perform nearby against the backdrop of the Kamas Valley.
“This is something that I’ve envisioned for so long as a ballet dancer turned farmer. Like, how amazing would it be to mesh the two?” Hannah said. “So I feel like this farm-to-table dinner is going to be really magnificent.”
The dinner is another step in the direction Ballerina Farm ultimately wants to go, where people can enjoy meals grown steps away, prepared by talented chefs and in an atmosphere celebrating the local community.
Hannah said plans include a café centered around farm-grown food, and eventually a cookery school inspired by the famed Ballymaloe Cookery School in Ireland, where the couple completed a 12-month culinary program.
As the business continues to expand, Hannah said they regularly return to the same guiding question: What values should define the business as it grows?
“There are a lot of opportunities to go a million different ways,” she said. “But what is our compass? What’s our moral compass to keep us on the track we want to be on?”
It’s why they recently finalized a mission statement: “To inspire more intentional living through the products we make and the stories we tell from the farm.”
“We want it to be a place where the whole family can come. We want it to be a place where you spend a few hours, you’re seeing the animals, you’re eating a meal, you’re playing on the playground or you’re going to the restaurant,” she said. “There are lots of dreams, and it’ll be exciting to watch them unfold.”