Ready, Set, Go.......Nap!

Getting ready for calving season involves a lot of "extras", like getting the hutches ready, cleaning the milk house and parlor, setting up maternity pens, putting up fences, and lots of scrubbing.  In fact, check out our list of things to do:

 

You'll notice we only three things crossed off....and calves can arrive any minute now!  With a new baby, we have only been able to have one person working at a time-and most of that time the last 6 weeks was spent doing regular chores.  But, we had a plan.  After we arrived back from vacation we  were going to mow right through that list! But we did not plan on over 1/2 of us getting severe colds.   We all know how important it is for your team members to be well rested and have time to recuperate when sick, but when you're the owner, that doesn't happen. In fact, an old joke in our house (and growing up) was that if you weren't on your death bed (or in the hospital), then you might as well be working.....

 

 

 

So we did. Today we lined up all the hutches for the newborn calves and bedded them with straw. 

 

Don't worry, we took a break for lunch and a little time for one of us to run and fetch some things we needed to finish the hutches: 1 calf panel, 9 fiberglass fence rods.  So now we at least have warm places to put the newborn calves.

 

Tomorrow is Easter. There will not be a lot of extra work done as we celebrate our risen Saviour. If the calves hold off until Monday, it will be one of the only Easter Holidays in the past 11 years that we haven't been milking.  The first year, we didn't have the parlor ready for milking, so I'm not sure if that counts!

 

 



HAPPY EASTER!

 

Milk & Eggs

The other day I found myself in an awkward situation.  We arrived home from vacation to find ourselves out of milk.  It was not our day to pick up milk from our source while the cows are dry.  We could have gone without for awhile if it weren’t for the toddler who kept checking the refrigerator with his cup, hollering “milk! milk!” So I went to the store.

I bet you are all wondering what kind of milk does a dairy farmer buy?  We prefer our own fresh un processed milk, but if that is not available we buy “whole” and “organic”.  In this case it was Horizon’s organic whole milk ½ gallon.

Please forgive us, Organic Valley friends (the competitor).  Horizon is what is available in my local store, and I have a family member who ships their farm’s milk to Horizon.

We buy whole (4%) because we believe the milk fat is good, especially for the kids.   Our own fresh un processed milk has an even higher percentage of milk fat, so sometimes even the “whole” variety seems a little light!

We buy organic because that means it came from cows that were not fed feed that had been sprayed with pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, and chemical fertilizers.  The cows also have not been treated with antibiotics or artificial hormones (rBst, for example).  Organic does not guarantee that the cows are from a dairy that practices grazing or a grass fed, forage based diet.  It also does not guarantee that it has more nutrients.  But it does mean that there are no chemicals or artificial hormones.

I also bought eggs. Say WHAT!!  Easter is upon us, and we do let the kids decorate eggs.  The store had white eggs on sale for $1/dozen.  We do not let the kids eat the colored eggs because of the food dyes. So it made sense to buy the white eggs (which color better) to save some money and we can save our fresh brown eggs for eating. 

I watched the ladies checking each carton of eggs before they put them in their cart.  I didn’t want to look like I didn’t know what I was doing, so I did the same.  I guess I was looking to see if any of them were cracked.  The funny thing is, at home, all we eat are cracks!  So I probably would have bought them anyway….

If you didn’t know, we do have fresh eggs for sale, $2.25/dozen.  Spring, summer and fall the chickens are outside scratching in the grass and the yolks are bright orange as compared to the yellow yolks you find at the store.  Drop by and pick up a dozen-I promise you there won’t be any cracks….we probably already ate them!

Out of our Control-

We have a favorite verse that we print on our farm shirts, presentations, stationary, etc.  It is Deut. 11:15 and it says “He will give you lush pastureland for your livestock and you yourselves will have all you want to eat.”  Sometimes the wording is “I will provide grass in your fields and you will eat and be satisfied.”  We love this because it says that God will provide. God provides the simplest of systems that work the way that they should.  Grass grows. Cows eat grass. Owners sell milk. Owners get to eat.  It’s really that simple.

We have spoken at conferences throughout the years. One time at a conference during a break, an older gentleman came over to us.  He chuckled, thinking how he was going to catch us off guard and asked if we knew what the Bible said immediately before that.   For some reason, I had just read it, so I was quick to reply “Sure we do. It says “if you obey….” and then continued to say that whenever we had a drought or a flood I always wondered who of our farmer friends weren’t obeying.  We had a good laugh at that.

So many things with farming are out of our control. The weather, for instance.  We can have all the hay equipment lined up and ready to go, and then it will rain for a month.  It did this in 2009.  The market, for another.  You can increase your herd and get more milk out of them than you ever have, and the price will fall through the floor.  This is where we just trust God to direct in our next steps, to put the right person in our path, to provide.  We do the best we can with the things that we can control and we let Him to the rest.  Sometimes it takes us awhile to remember to not worry and let Him do that, but that is the goal.

Consider how much easier your life would be if you let someone else (God) do the worrying about the things that are out of your control.  Just do the best you can with what you can control.

Yesterday we got a chance to visit Rick's sister and brother in law's farm, who have a new barn where they are using a compost bedding pack.  A compost bedded pack most likely uses sawdust or shavings for bedding instead of straw or sand.  The pack is stirred twice daily, mixing the shavings with the manure to create the compost.  These barns are less expensive to build, having not to pour concrete for the barn floor or purchase free stalls.

The cows love it!  We do too-so much that we are looking at putting up one of these barns.  This way, when the cows are on grass in the summer months, we can use this barn to store other things if needed.  Currently our cows are out-wintered, which means that have access to a wind break, but for the most part they stay outside.  We have not had any problem with out-wintering, and the cows are very healthy, so to be real honest, a new barn would be more for our own comfort......

Robin and Randy have an exceptional herd of cattle with awesome genetics.  They show them across the country at dairy shows and have more trophies than can be displayed in the house.  Their cows are giants compared to our crossbred New Zealand Frisian Holsteins and Jerseys. They are also very friendly.....   



Somehow, even when we get away from the farm, we still end up on a farm!