Remember His Goodness

Lately, I have spent alot of time appreciating WHERE God has planted my family and seeing the beauty all around us.  I guess I have been looking through new eyes, visitor eyes.  Maybe it is because we have had several visitors here on the farm in the last year, maybe it is because I'm getting to be "that age."  The age where you get all sappy.  But look at this this straight out of the camera photo of the flat lands of Illinois full of corn and bean beauty.

Each year my hubs plants millions of seeds, thousands, billions...technically not important here, and look what happens.  That there is God's grace for us. 

I can't deny the beauty of it all.  The lush green leaves contrasting with the deep black soil.  The new growth fertilized by the drying and dead remnants of last year's crop. Beauty.

Acres and acres, miles and miles of fulfilled promises on the backdrop of flat plains and far reaching blue skies. Beauty.

We don't have mountains or waterfalls or 1,000 lakes or rolling hills here in Central Illinois, but what we DO have is absolutely breathtaking....if you look at it with a thankful heart.

30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 6

Day 6-USA

I technically still have two hours to meet my goal of blogging every day.  Yes, first thing in the morning would be best, but I’m full of good intentions and my days are full of a job and my nights are full of ball games and ninjitsu lessons and music lessons and laundry.  Let’s not forget the laundry.  So forgive me that I’m posting in the evening. 

Last winter, Justin traveled to China and India to learn about agriculture in other countries.  Today, on election day 2012, I am thankful to live on a farm in the USA. Each year on the Saturday before July 4th, our town has a huge celebration including a parade. Last year our family of five entered our miniature horse and cart.  Picture: little pony, little cart, 5 people, 104 degrees.  It worked out fine, but it was a little nerve wracking considering the horse had never seen the city limits.  Not to mention heard a siren or walked down a packed street with people waving flags and throwing candy.

This year the 4H group put together an entry.  This was the brain child of my oldest.  She kinda likes pigs.

Our friends like goats, but that was too hard, so they decorated their golf cart USA/4H!

     And our Boy Scout Troop did too.Our Boy Scouts had an entry too.   What says USA more than a rack wagon full of toothy, sweaty boys sporting the Cub Scout Blues and waving flags? Those are my blondie boys in the middle.

We are proud to wave our flag in the Fourth of July Parade and we pray often for our country.  We pray for the future we are leaving for our children.  We pray that whatever man is elected as President, he is able to make wise decisions.  We are hopeful. We are a proud American Farm Family.

 

Want to start at the beginning? Day 1

Want to follow along and learn more about farming and food? Click on over to 30 Days on a Prairie Farm Series.

LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,kids

10 Things Everyone Should Know About Pigs

Today, I thought I'd share a real, just as it is,  shot at life with a small herd of show pigs.  

 

1. Showing pigs is addictive, just as a warning, if you try, you might just love it! 

2. Our show pigs are always born in January or February of the show year and shown in the summer.

3. Our pigs ultimately end up in our freezer come fall.

4.  Show pigs have a good life.  They are cared for very, very well.

5. We don't breed our own pigs, but buy them in the spring and sell them for meat or breeding in the fall. We let someone else, who loves to go out in January and February to care for a ginormous grouchy sow as she gives birth to 152 babies (not really 152, but many) have that pleasure.

6. Pigs each have their own personalities with likes and dislikes as well as eating/drinking/pooping habits.  Like human babies, eating/drinking/pooping = important to monitor.

7. Show pigs make for some fantastic bacon on a lazy Saturday morning in January when breeders are schlepping water to a ginormous sow laying under a heat lamp with 152 babies. I'm gorging myself with thick, black pepper laden slices of bacon.  

8. Our show pigs make some great convenience food when I cook a pork burger in 7 minutes flat to feed MY 152 babies and their friends.

9. Pigs prefer to drink from a nipple system in their pens.  (I should post some pictures of that.  Pink curly pigs' tongues around that nipple contraption is a funny thang!) Also, the word nipple makes me giggle.  

10. Pigs like you to scratch their bellies, rub behind their ears and lay with them in their pens, while the fans blow on the two of you. 

11. (Bonus) Pigs are smart.

My oldest son was playing hide and seek at the 4H fair with his buddy.  I think hiding next to a 250 lb hunka hunka of love is a great hiding spot, don't you?  Thanks to my good friend for catching the moment with her camera.

 

This is Boss Hogg. We heart Boss Hogg.  He is a gentle giant.  He loves the kids.  He is kind.  He is big.  He is pink.  (technically he is white, but it's my story, he is pink.) 

 

I Spy Farm Style

I spy with my little eye….

What, what is that I spy?

   

This is my daughter's photos of our newest addition.  She is a dairy cross goat.  That means she is a mutt of sorts. She is a mix of two kinds of dairy goats.  Dairy goats are for producing milk.

 

But, it's only fair to let you all in on a little-known factoid…..tuck it away, and some day, if you lead a very exciting life like I do (wink wink) you may be able to pull this information out and wow your friends at a dinner party.  Here goes:  a dairy goat doesn't just produce milk all the time.  She has to be bred to start producing milk, then once the babies are weaned, PEOPLE keep milking her and keep her body thinking that she has babies to feed, so it keeps producing milk.  Actually, when she has babies that are nursing, people can milk her extra times and make her produce more milk than her baby can use.  So did you know that?  The same goes for dairy cattle.  

    

Our girl's name is Cookie and  she was a twin to Cream.  We bought her from a friend of the family when she was just a "bottle baby."  Her mother wasn't able to care for the twins so she had to be fed with a bottle.  We bought milk replacer and mixed it with water and fed her every day. Aw…..I can hear you now.  So sweet.  Bottle babies are generally more attached to their humans, as you may expect.  We love Cookie, however, her attachment goes a little far for us on occasion.  She is ALLLLLLLL over us!  Case in point:

"Naaaaaaaa, you can drive."

 

How to Entertain Kids In the Summer et al

Wow, it has been HOT HOT HOT!  I can't even tell you how many 90-100 degree days we have had here and how little rain we have actually had on our home farm.  We farm in several areas around our home farm and some of them have had more rain than others.  However, right here on the home farm it's almost a joke.  Home farm, home farm, home farm.  Ha. My 11 year old daughter said yesterday as she gazed at the dark blue sky to the north, then 30 minutes later, to the east "it's almost like it's trying NOT to rain on us on purpose!"  So true.  Thirteen miles away, my brother -in-law got over an inch on Saturday!  Here....just enough to wet the walk.  

I am sure the hubinizer knows just how much rain we have had here in the last month exactly.  I'm just going to say, it taint much! In the hot sun, in the heat of the day, the field corn will curl a little like in this picture. It's kind of like us squinting our eyes, it just reduces the bright sun's influence.  

I am so positive the farmers reading this would not choose to describe it like this, but hey, it's my blog!  Our corn has been doing a lot of squinting these days.  Sadly, it's been focusing it's efforts on squinting and wiping sweat from it's brow and not putting much energy into growing full, healthy cobs full of juicy kernels.  We shall see, but some of the crop looks a bit iffy to say the least.  

On another matter, no matter the weather, this 1972ish golf cart is our number one go to entertainment around here.  This belonged to my husband's grandparents who used it to tool around their yard and pond.  We inherited it many years ago and it is a staple.  

My advice:  if it's feasible.  BUY ONE OF THESE BABIES FOR YOUR KIDS!  It's fairly slow, you almost can't tear it up (though we have done some damage over the years) and it's cheap to run.  

Just do it.

You'll see a lot of this baby on my blog.  I should name her.