Nine kids, a 40lb turkey and a broken oven: could your Christmas survive Amanda Owen’s rules?

On a 2,000-acre Yorkshire hill farm, winter brings biting winds, frozen tarns and a Christmas that refuses to stop for anyone.

While many hunker down with mince pies and back-to-back telly, Amanda Owen’s brood lace up boots. Their festive season unfolds outside, among sheep, dogs and the endless list of jobs a farm throws up when the rest of the country shuts.

Life on the hill farm in midwinter

Ravenseat sits miles from suburban comforts, where weather writes the timetable. December can mean horizontal rain, sudden snow and days that seem to end before they’ve begun. Animals still need feeding. Fences still need fixing. Tyres burst at the worst moment. Repairs can’t wait for Boxing Day.

Amanda Owen, first-generation sheep farmer and mother of nine, long ago stopped trying to make Christmas look like a department-store window. The cues are subtler here: a turkey that barely fits the oven, dogs squabbling over giblets, too many elbows for too few chairs, mismatched plates and a constant stream of neighbours, friends and family who’d rather pull on gloves than pull a cracker.

Christmas at Ravenseat is special precisely because nothing changes. The work carries on, the land sets the pace, and celebration fits around it.

It’s a far cry from Owen’s own suburban upbringing in Huddersfield. Back then, everyone retreated indoors. Now, the family heads out. If the oven packs in, the bird roasts over open flame. If the tarns freeze, the children learn to skate. A runaway reindeer once bounded across nearby moorland and ended up written into family folklore.

Runaway reindeer and frozen tarns

Snow transforms the Dales into a white amphitheatre. It’s beautiful and unforgiving. The Owen children, raised on grit and improvisation, turn it into play and purpose. Their “Winter Olympics” might involve hay-bale hurdles, improvised sledging or a timed dash to thaw a frozen trough. The point is not perfection but participation, resilience and fun.

There’s romance in the chaos, but also hard mathematics: nine mouths to feed, a 40lb turkey to wrangle, and no guarantee the electrics will behave if anyone gets ambitious with fairy lights. The goats, Owen jokes, would find a way to chew the cable anyway.

From TV to the page: why a children’s book now

After years of telling her story on screen, Owen has turned to the page with her first children’s title, Christmas Tales from the Farm. It draws on real incidents and real weather, not fantasy. Her childhood tastes ran to books about animals and agriculture. That instinct to ground stories in what you can touch hasn’t shifted.

Illustrated by Becca Hall and published by Puffin, the book gathers crisp, festive vignettes from the Dales: sheep steaming in the cold, collies eager for work, and a household that turns mishaps into memories. Owen has already penned five books for adults and plans six children’s titles, expanding a universe where the facts of farming underpin every plot twist.

These are stories that smell of peat smoke and wet wool, where the punchline is often a practical fix rather than a tidy moral.

What readers will find in Christmas Tales from the Farm

• Four-legged cast members: sheep, cows, dogs, chickens, horses and goats with very human quirks.
• Family traditions such as their home-spun “Winter Olympics” built from whatever the farm offers.
• Real mishaps, including the year the oven failed and dinner shifted to an open fire.
• Weather as a character, starring driving rain, deep snow and days that vanish by mid-afternoon.

Christmas without the catalogue gloss

Forget curated tablescapes and origami napkins. Ravenseat’s festive table creaks under the weight of people and portions, not perfection. The gravy pan is always too small. Someone sits on a hay bale because the chairs ran out. You can sense warmth, even if the plates don’t match and the terriers eye the leftovers like a heist.

That refusal to keep up with the Joneses sits at the heart of Owen’s appeal. She doesn’t sell a manual for living, parenting or farming. The family’s telly journey—from Our Yorkshire Farm to Amanda Owen’s Farming Lives, Reuben Owen: Life in the Dales and the ongoing renovation saga Our Farm Next Door—works because viewers recognise something unvarnished. Sometimes it goes right. Sometimes it goes awry. The camera doesn’t guarantee a neat outcome.

Show
Focus

Our Yorkshire Farm
Daily life of a Dales farming family

Amanda Owen’s Farming Lives
Stories from farms across Britain

Reuben Owen: Life in the Dales
Next-generation projects and graft

Our Farm Next Door
Turning Anty John’s into a future family home

This winter, Owen takes that mix of grit and humour on tour with Onwards and Upwards: Farming, Family and Fiascos, sharing stage stories about rescuing broken machinery, restoring Anty John’s and how a rural Christmas keeps its shape when nothing else does.

Nine children, 2,000 acres and one stubborn schedule: Christmas happens around the work, not instead of it.

Why it resonates with you

Many households face similar pressures, even if they don’t run a flock. Money is tight. Family expectations clash. The pressure to stage the perfect day can flatten the joy. Owen’s approach—use what you have, welcome who turns up, keep the job list honest—offers a template that strips away cost and theatre without losing affection.

• Set one “outdoors hour” each day over the holidays. Walk, mend, plant or feed. Physical tasks reset the mood.
• Plan low-tech rituals: a torchlit walk, carols round a fire pit, or a board game tournament.
• Share the load. Give each guest one non-negotiable task, from basting to bin duty.
• Prepare a Plan B for dinner. If the oven fails, can you barbecue the bird, slow-cook joints or split the menu?
• Keep winter kit by the door: boots, head torches, spare batteries, thermal gloves, pet-safe grit for icy paths.

The practical side of a rugged Christmas

Hill farms run on readiness. If you’re braving rural roads, store a blanket, shovel, tow strap, snacks and water in the car. For homes prone to outages, test the generator, stash candles safely and keep a flask topped up. Animal owners should check water lines for freezing and allocate time for extra rounds when temperatures plunge.

Weather-driven storytelling also opens a door for children. A festive book rooted in real chores teaches consequence, teamwork and the difference between pretty snow and working snow. Parents can use each chapter as a prompt: what would you pack if the power went out? How would you move a heavy turkey safely? Which job comes first when daylight is short?

There’s a creative lesson too. Owen’s tales show that drama lives in the everyday. A puncture on Christmas Eve is a headache and a plot point. A reindeer loose on the moor is a problem and a page-turner. Children learn that the best stories don’t need wizards; they need attention, patience and a setting that refuses to behave.

If your own December feels too staged, borrow a page from Ravenseat. Start with what won’t change—care for people, care for animals, hot food, a roof if you can manage it—and build the rest around that. The photographs won’t match a glossy catalogue, but the memories will stick. And when plans buckle, that’s not failure. It’s the moment the anecdote begins.