Toohey & Sons Organic is a true family affair. Jim and Esther Toohey hail from Tennessee, where Esther grew up farming her parents' 300 acres in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. They arrived in Colorado in the late 70's, and raised their three children in Boulder's University Hill neighborhood. That was where Christian, their oldest, began to tend a garden out back. Jim and Esther passed their love of the land on to all of their children, and together dreamed of turning their backyard passion into a family business. Their dream came true in 2005, when they moved into a 100 year old farmhouse on the old Loomiller homestead, just north of Hygiene. The site used to be one of the state's oldest stagecoach stops, as the giant burr oak and eastern red cedar can attest. The Tooheys now care for 38 breathtakingly beautiful acres, keeping much of it as pasture and woodland. In the middle of it all are the rows of crops, irrigated by the Rough & Ready irrigation ditch that was dug in 1869. The family agrees that Christian is chief farmer, but Jim and Esther as well as Kellan and Joanna Hope are all on the gardening team—and they help manage the farm and their popular stand at the farmers' market. The Tooheys are a close family, and they pour a lot of love into their work. Their vegetables—from delicate leeks to glowing orbs of eggplant—speak for themselves, and have become favorites of Boulder chefs and market shoppers.