As I was doing my daily walk through our pastures and gardens today, it occurred to me that we are already at the end of May. We are feeling a little pressure to get a few projects done in time, but I have to remind myself that everything gets done and worrying won’t do any good. The days fly so quickly that I’m convinced that it is only by God’s grace that everything is getting done (sometimes just in time).

I was reminded recently of how precious life is after my husband cut up his knee while he was removing branches from cedar trees and the chain saw slipped. After hearing the story, I was so thankful he was okay and realized it could have been much worse. It was very sore, but nothing too serious. Praise the Lord! It was a good reminder that things can happen fast, to always think safety, and to cherish every day because there are no guarantees. My husband told me that he will be buying some chaps for future cutting. I didn’t even know anything like that existed.

Today Aiden, Annika, and I put the broilers out to pasture. It’s always good to get them out of the barn and onto the pasture. They are still pretty small so we will need to monitor them closely and make sure they stay warm and dry. That may mean putting on an extra tarp every once in a while, to keep them dry with the rainy, cool weather coming. We learned that lesson the hard way last year when we lost several birds in one night from the cold, wet weather.

The pigs have been moved a few times to work up the hay areas that our sheep and cows made over the winter, and they are finally headed to the pasture tomorrow morning. They were scheduled to go out today, but we couldn’t get the fence hot enough. With my husband gone again all day, and this evening, we decided to wait for his wisdom in the morning. We added cover crops to the areas as they were working them, and some of that is coming up. Cory and I don’t want any areas without roots or coverage on the farm. We will see how well our plan works out. These areas will be grazed later on this summer.

I am a little nervous about our pig move tomorrow (it’s a longer one than normal) especially without my husband’s help. Pigs tend to go every which way and there are always at least two that just won’t stay with the group. We are hoping to make our moves easier this year by having pasture areas right next to each other. Hopefully they won’t escape as much when we move them. Getting them to this new area will be the challenge tomorrow. We try to stay positive and have fun and always try to remember to pray before we start, because this job can really test everyone’s patience. The sows and boar (Mamas and Papa pig) refused to move today so I had Caleb move their feed and water onto their new area and when they get hungry and creep onto their new pasture, we will shut the fence behind them.

Now the moving really begins. Milk cows and our Ram (Pa Pa Sheep) get moved daily to a new pasture area, sheep and cows are in a different area and get moved every day. The chickens that lay the eggs get moved every two days, the broilers (meat birds) get moved every day, the pigs will get moved every 5 to 12 days, and the sows will get moved a little less frequently than the pigs. Putting up new fence, moving waters and minerals, and getting the animals across the finish line can be time consuming.  Some days it feels like the only thing we accomplish is moving animals! When I witness the health of the animals and the pastures, I remember that it’s all worth it.

We are only milking one cow at this time, but soon we will be adding more as calving begins. We haven’t decided how many cows we want to milk, but I do think it will be more than two, because I didn’t feel like the milk provided enough cream for what I wanted to do last summer. Since we don’t feed any grains to our cows, they only produce 2 to 4 gallons in a day depending on the season. That’s not near as much as the 10 gallons a Holstein can produce. This last year I have been convinced that the raw milk from our pastured cows (especially the cream and butter) is one of the best things we produce for our health and especially that of our growing children. It will be my main focus this growing season.

Weeds are growing faster than my plants on the farm. Thankfully my little ones (including Lillian the baby) love to spend time in the garden with me, so I’m not struggling to get into the garden as much as I did last summer with a new baby. Lillian has her own area in the shade of my wood chip garden and she loves to play in the dirt. She may have eaten a little too by looking at her face when we headed in for Kailey’s delicious lunch of homemade pasta salad and homemade breaded fish. I’m always so thankful that we don’t use any chemicals on our farm or yard. Our soil is truly life promoting and our kids can run, forage, and play anywhere without concern of being poisoned. There are some areas that are off limits for safety reasons, but even those are fine with adult supervision.

For me spring feels like starting over (another chance to attempt to do things better). I always plant too much and take on a little more than I can handle, but I love it all, and I can’t think of anything I want to give up. The best part is being able to work and have fun with our family. This lifestyle and eating the nutritious, life-promoting food from the farm, as well as providing others with it, is just too rewarding. We are thankful for our family and friends, new life on the farm, improved health, wisdom from the Lord, and peace and joy in a crazy time. Will you be planting or raising anything new this spring? We would love to hear from you!