The book is full of family stories and my personal journey too!
About the Axisa Family
learn more about us and our journey
Our family is Anna and Peter Axisa, together with our two beautiful, energetic daughters Lacey and Elke. We live on a 10-acre mountainside in the Manning Valley, NSW Australia. In 2014, years of manifestation rewarded us with a steep- sloped, overgrown property with no infrastructure or services. Others thought we were crazy to take on such a seemingly impossible site and we agreed that with not much money or experience behind us, it certainly would not be easy. At the end of the day, it was the only affordable option, and we quickly decided we were up for the challenge. Our shared vision was to transform the property into a regenerative permaculture paradise and forge a self-reliant future for our family.
We had dreamed of living and working on the land but were looking for a sign to point us in the right direction. Then we got it! I came across an online advertisement for a small, rundown, compost worm operation for sale. A persuasive proposal landed us some investment and we purchased the business. The flow-on effect from that moment is still unbelievable to us, and to most who hear our story.
Neither Peter nor I had any prior experience in vermiculture (worm-farming), only the desire to work in harmony with nature and what we thought we knew about living on the land. The adventure had begun, and worms quickly became our passion.
There is something humbling about going without.
We camped out under a tarp for months while we worked on the new worm enterprise, until a suitable site was excavated, and a shed finally constructed. Solar shower bags, dug-out toilets, lights run off old car batteries and ice-filled eskies became our everyday reality. The family ‘rewilded’ together and developed a love for a back to basics, life of voluntary simplicity.
In 2016, at the age of 26, I was diagnosed with a chronic auto-immune disease – but this certainly has not deterred us from moving forward and continuing to achieve our dreams. We have adopted a ‘food as medicine’ approach to our lives and are grateful to the worms for producing fertile, organic soil to grow nutrient-dense food. We strive to live regeneratively, based on the foundational ethics of earth, people and future care, guided by the principles of permaculture.
