An icon of the “tradwife” motion, web movie star Ballerina Farm popularized a “good nation life-style” (Instagram/@ballerinafarm)
To the world, Hannah Neeleman has a fantasy life straight out of an episode of The Ingalls Household. The blonde and delightful 33-year-old lives in a big white picket home positioned on an idyllic 328-acre farm in Utah, United States. She is a full-time housewife, and dedicates her life to caring for her eight kids and husband, for whom she cooks each day from scratch, stews made out of the substances she grows. In her residence there aren’t any cell telephones, tablets or tv. Aside from a tool that information the whole lot, and which she makes use of to create content material that she shares together with her 7.5 million followers on TikTok underneath the pseudonym Ballerina Farm.
Is she a standard spouse or a businesswoman? The younger individuals who watched her movies puzzled, nostalgic for the obvious “loss” of previous gender values and suspicious of a actuality that hyper-consumerist society denied them.
The Neeleman household lives on a farm in Utah, surrounded by nature and animals (Instagram/@ballerinafarm)
Nevertheless, a fast background examine led her viewers to find that her household relationship shouldn’t be so humble or austere behind the scenes. Her husband, Daniel Neeleman, is without doubt one of the sons of businessman David Neeleman, founding father of JetBlue and 4 different main airways around the globe. “So it was all a farce,” “it was a staged set,” “she’s one other privileged white girl,” wrote incredulously customers on social media.
However no. Hannah by no means pretended. And if she is to be blamed for something, it might be for romanticizing her actuality and exhibiting a touching nation life, when she needed to abandon her ardour for ballet for a household life so exhausting that “typically she will get so sick from exhaustion that she will’t get away from bed for per week,” as her personal companion revealed.
A lot of the actions she reveals on social media embody family chores reminiscent of cooking from scratch, elevating livestock and caring for her kids (Instagram/@ballerinafarm)
In an article in The Occasions, Hannah Neeleman was described as “the queen of the tradwifes,” a motion that glorifies a way of life primarily based on Christian beliefs from the Fifties and Nineteen Sixties, which dictate that ladies are born to look after the house and household. On this trope, the spouse owes blind obedience to her husband and the person turns into the first supplier.
In Spain, a preferred 22-year-old influencer referred to as Roro was the newest to be criticized underneath this hashtag for posting movies the place she cooks “no matter he needs” for her boyfriend, whereas explaining her process in a fragile, candy and even passive tone of voice. Like Hannah, her qualities have made her the item of idealization for a number of conservative males, even proclaiming her “the fear of feminists.”
Each Roro and Ballerina Farm have been accused of selling an unrealistic life-style and perpetuating gender stereotypes (Instagram/@roro.bueno)
Earlier than calling herself Ballerina Farm, nevertheless, Hannah was certainly a ballet dancer educated on the Juilliard Academy, some of the prestigious establishments on the earth that solely accepts 24 college students per yr. “I didn’t at all times need this life. I left residence after I was 17 and was excited to return to New York, I cherished the power of the town. And I wished to be a dancer, I used to be good at it,” she advised The Occasions.
However her future husband had different plans for her. He was 23 when he met her, and he instantly wished them to get married. For six months, he tried to win her over by all attainable means, and solely succeeded once they “coincidentally” met on a flight, sitting subsequent to one another. Hannah believed it was destiny, whereas Daniel omitted that his father was the proprietor of the airline and he had organized the assembly.
Hannah Neeleman’s husband is a historian and son of the founding father of JetBlue (@ballerinafarm)
“On the time I believed we should always date for a yr. That method I might end college and the whole lot else. And Daniel was like, ‘It’s not going to work, now we have to get married now,’” she mentioned. “However I knew that after I began having children, my life would begin to look totally different.”
Not even two months later, the Mormon couple was married and dwelling in a rented condo on the Higher West Aspect. A yr later, they welcomed their first youngster, and since then, each 9 months because the delivery of a kid, she has been pregnant once more.
Hannah Neeleman has given delivery at residence and with out painkillers to 6 of her eight kids (@ballerinafarm)
Her births are notably painful as a result of she does not use painkillers. “I’ve by no means favored taking them,” she revealed. She solely used an epidural as soon as, and that was as a result of she was two weeks late in giving delivery. “It was nice,” she mentioned, smiling.
It was Daniel’s dream of dwelling in “the good wilds of the West” that led them to decide on the prairie. He wished to farm, put on linen, and reside off the land—very like his favourite sitcom, Little Home on the Prairie. The Seventies present can be the one factor his kids can watch at residence, utilizing maybe one of many few Twenty first-century devices they’ve entry to: a pc.
Hannah and Daniel are dad and mom to eight kids, making them one of many largest households amongst influencers (Instagram/@ballerinafarm)
The remainder of the time, the eight little ones need to invent new methods to entertain themselves, whether or not it is taking part in playing cards, leaping on the trampoline or watching their mom do the house responsibilities. As a result of there isn’t any nanny, only a housekeeper who helps Hannah clear the massive home.
As if being a full-time housewife wasn’t sufficient, Ballerina Farm nonetheless finds time to be an influencer and entrepreneur. Her content material is not simply unique to TikTok, as she has 9.1 million followers on Instagram and 1.6 million subscribers on YouTube.
Along with its pseudonym, Ballerina Farm is the title of the household enterprise, the place they produce varied family merchandise and meals (@ballerinafarm)
And though leaving dance “was laborious” and “compelled her to surrender part of herself,” she mentioned she seems like “I am a feminist.” As a result of whereas the general public sees her on their screens cooking, baking, milking, amongst different family chores, and on the whole, being a “conventional spouse,” they overlook the truth that she usually promotes her private model, which sells the whole lot from footwear, tablecloths, and pots, to baked items kits and cuts of meat.
She doesn’t see herself as a sufferer, and maintains that she has different private hobbies. For instance, since her childhood she has participated in magnificence pageants and was topped Mrs. Utah in 2021 and Mrs. American in 2023. She additionally dances in entrance of cameras and in personal when attainable. Nevertheless, the Occasions journalist who went to her residence seen that her sequined attire are presently perishing inside packing containers within the storage, whereas a small barn that she tried to transform into her ballet studio ended up getting used as a classroom for the youngsters.
