Thursday, April 21, 2011

Recent Pics

Asher right after getting scolded. He literally snuck cookies from the snack drawer while I was outside. Check out his expression in the second picture....

This is his "What?!?" look.


This is him just starting to break down.



Our barn progress. A little bit more is done now, but not much unfortunately. That is Anna and Gee out in the yard with sparky.




What Leah chooses to do in her little free time. He would be a pretty girl......... Just kidding.




Gideon getting a Leah "do."







Anna and her updo!




Maddie's pretty bun!




Impromptu monkey bread. Soooo yummy, even though I actually resisted any from this batch.




Just wrong on so many levels. Look at the grease soaking through the corrugated! The kids thought it was great.








Check out the turtle that just appeared in our yard. We are pretty sure it has been hiding out under old outbuilding all winter. It had moss on its back and was pretty big. Here is a chicken checking it out.




See how big it is! Yikes!




These were some very yummy graham crackers I made with the kids. It was fun to do and they were super yummy! It even used WW flour.



This is our new egg indubator. I am very excited about this! Right now we have over a dz heritage deleware eggs in there. They are on day 13 of a 21 day incubation. We have candled them and couple times and they are looking really good (I think, I am certainly no expert). Hopefully next week we will see some hatch!





Until Later!


Julie



Tuesday, April 19, 2011

So very tired of rain.

I know it is spring and rain is just part of this time of year........however.......I have had enough rain already! Seriously, it is getting ridiculous. We had a nice day on Sunday and we were literally outside all day. We got a lot done, but there is so much more to do and I can't get outside. Mud and puddles are everywhere! We have places in our yard that are just like soup and the have been off and on for weeks. Multiple vehicles have gotton stuck and we have ruts in our yard the size of small swimming pools. Ok, have I complained enough???? I could go on, but I won't. I think I will just praise God that I have a nice warm and DRY house to sleep in every night.

A non-whiney update is coming with pictures..... Yeah! Pictures are always fun!

Julie

Monday, April 11, 2011

Farm Girl Stuff

Well, as of yesterday, all of our calves for the spring have been born. We ended up with a set of white twins, two black calves and one singleton white calf (born yesterday). In terms of a money making endeaver, this was not our best start at things. Both the black calves are not considered breed standard for the White Parks (kind of obvious, I guess). Apparently our chances of getting a black calf were around 10% and our chances of getting twins was even less. Go figure. We are still trying to decide what to do with everyone from a financial perspective. From an enjoyment perspective, it is a little different for me. I love our little flock. I am really enjoying the breed. They are hardy, good mother's (except for our poor Sparky), non-aggressive, but understandably protective. Plus, I think they are beautiful animals. And yes, I will be able to eat them. I undertand that it is just part of it all. Our most recent little black calf (born last week). This is the little one born just yesterday. He/she is probably about 6 or 7 hours old here. Saturday afternoon we had an Etiquette Dinner with our 4H club. Here is a picture of Leah and her table. Ok, back to cows. This is just a picture of both our black cows together with their mama's. It is funny how our White Parks tend to hang with one another out in the field. This is Sparky's mama and twin sister. Our little black calf #2, about a day old. How cute is it???? Our barn progress. I am so excited to see our barn moving along. With the rain, it is moving more slowly than I would like, but it is still moving, so I shall focus on the positive! Ok, this is totally not farm girl stuff, but it is my nasty garage. Right now our garage totally stresses me out. We have chickens in there, that have no other place to go and just a bunch of junk! I can't do anything about the chickens right now, but I can do something about the junk. I decided to tackle one wall at a time. Here is wall #1, before. Embarrassing, yes. An "after" picture will hopefully come in a few days.


One last little cow picture...... So cute.



The kids and I made these coffee filter flowers. I don't do near as many projects with the kids as I would like, but this was a good one. It was a two day project because you have to let them dry once you color them, but they turned out so nice. What was even nicer was letting the kids hand deliver them, along with some muffins, to some our special relatives.



Julie

Saturday, April 9, 2011

First Dance

So Ms. Leah had her first dance last night. She went with a buddy of hers and they apparently had an "awesome" time. Said buddy came over to the house early to help prep. Daddy got his camera out! Here is Madeline wishing she was going to a dance. Bless her heart. She was so interested in everything Leah was doing. She is such a little diva wanna-be. Leah getting her hair done and eating steak and fries. Ummm, in our bathroom. Slightly icky, yes. Btw, Leah has INCREDIBLY thick hair, oh my. It took forever to do the ringlets Leah help "buddy" get her necklace on. I just love the smile on buddy's face. How cute is she? Leah in her pretties. How beautiful is this kid? So grown up. I just love her to pieces!

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Got Raw Milk?

Most people are familiar with the term "raw milk." It is milk that has not been pasteurized. I have done quite a bit of research on the subject and have concluded that in the right settings, people can drink raw milk very safely. I also believe that raw milk has great natural benefits for the average person. With that being said, we decided to pasteurize our milk. I was more the raw milk type, but Ryan, well, not so much. Probably the biggest thing for me though was neices/nephews/friends that come to visit. I want our house to be a unquestionably "safe" enviroment for everyone and my leanings toward raw milk aren't so dead set that I'm not willing bend some. Home pasteurization is a little different though than what the big dairies do. Our milk is not ultra-pasteurized, which I am still reading up on, but so far it appears that our milk maintains more nutrients and "good stuff" than store milk (don't quote me on that, like I said, I am still researching). Also, our milk has not been homogenized like store bought milk it. To spare you the science lesson, we get all the benefits of cream with our milk. Which for us means fresh butter (and maybe more at some point). We plan to get our own milking cow, but we are pretty picky with what we want, so it takes a little time. At this point we are blessed with raw milk from a good friend. I tried pasteurizing our milk on the stove, but it was very hard to get just right and the taste was very much affected. Ryan let me buy a pasteurizer and I love it. It is super easy and the milk tastes great. I though it might be interesting to show you how we pasteurized our milk. Asher, ever time I get the camera out he says "cheeeeeeeeese" and I have to take a picture. Oh, here is some real vanilla that I am making. This is my first time making it, but I have been wanting to try for a while! It is just cheap vodka and real vanilla beans. The hall I am painting. I seriously thought I was going to die climbing the ladder and such. Ok, this is our pasteurizer. The tube hanging off the side has a cork in it. The pasteurizer gets filled with water and this is the "drain pipe" if you will. Here is what our raw milk looks like. The pics aren't great, but if you look real close you can see the cream at the top. This is the pot with the milk in it. That pot rests in the bigger pot. The bigger pot gets filled with water. There's a burner at the bottom of the biggest pot that heats the water. It takes about 15 minutes to pasteurize. All you do is plug it in and a buzzer sounds when it is done. After it is done, you quickly circulate cold water through the same way you filled the pot. That is it. This is how you fill the pot up. All my clean supplies. Here is how we store our milk in the fridge. It works great because all the cream rises to the top and is easy to skim off. I would say the milk we drink is probably between 1% to 2%. The pasteurizer does 2 gallons at a time, so I am pasteurizing twice a week. I also included a pic of how I store my stuff and try to keep things organized. Just a couple fun pictures! My two girlies and a picture of all the kids loving on Olivia! Oh, and not to be forgotten, here is a picture of our new little black calf. He/she seems to be doing well! Julie

Friday, April 1, 2011

First track meet, Little lady #2 is getting big and another new baby!

Leah had her first track meet yesterday. She did great and we are really proud of her! Running her relay..... In between matches sucking on a highly nutritious tootsie pop. Next to her is a really sweet gal Leah runs with. We were struck with how much they look alike. It was really kind of wierd. Asher even called the new girl "Weah" when he first saw her. So, Madeline got her first official babysitting job this morning. She watched Asher for me while I fed Sparky (who is doing well, thank you very much). She was so mature about it. She even took his snack away from him before I even left because she did not want him to "choke on too big of bites." When I came back in (after like 5 minutes), she very maturely told me that Asher was a good boy for her. It was really cute and really she did a great job with him. I think they just rolled the ball accross the kitchen floor the whole time. Another cow update.... We have another new calf. We think it is a heifer, although I didn't get a great look. The funny thing is that she is all black. No, this is not typical with "White" Parks. It really is a genetic flaw of sorts. It does happen within the breed, but only when a bull and cow are both carriers of the gene. I kind of wish she had been a "he." Then we would just grow the calf out for meat, which we can still do even if it is a heifer, but just not as ideal. We will not include this calf in the breeding "program" because she does not meet the breed standard. Nuts. However, she (and mama) seem to be doing well, which is all I really care about right now. I will get pics as soon as I find my camera! Julie

Psalms 10:14, 17-18

"You are the helper of the fatherless.  LORD, You have heard the desire of the humble; You will prepare their heart; You will cause Your ear to hear, To do justice to the fatherless and the oppressed, That the man of the earth may oppress no more."