New Year.... or is it

hello everyone... its been a while. Life here at the dairy is quite busy. We are in 10 farmers markets a week. I am making cheese 3 days a week and doing 3 markets a week,. David is working the other 7 and our soon to be (HOPE HOPE) daughter-in-law is doing our Longview market. We are milking 66 goats and have about 120 goats on our dairy. Ali now has 40 chickens and is selling thier eggs. Well I have to go check on my cheese that I am making today. Hope I can get back on this blog soon to fill you in on whats else has been happening.

Catch up to date

Well so much has happened. I'll say we have been busy as bee's around the farm. Our Anatolian shepards puppies are all sold but one - a female - Lea.
I am a grandma again. I flew to Austin Texas to be with Tami and Mike for thier first baby. They were not due until March and so I had bred my goats to kidd the first part of Feb. and to hopefully be done by the first part of March. Well they enduce my daughter and I had to fly out the 9th of Feb. And the goats kidded in 9 days as soon as I was off the ground in the plane. David and Ali were the only ones home and our Intern Francis from Texas arrived the day before I flew out. They all did good with the kidding season - 130 kids romping on the ground. I came home the first week in March - proud grandma of a new grandson - Erick.
When I got home I hit the ground running. Almost all the babies were sold before I got home which ment I had to make cheese. Our Farmers Markets started the end of March. We were ready and David was off to make money. We are signed up for 10 markets again. Longview(Sat), Olympia (Thur. & Fri), Tacoma (Tue, Thur., Sat., Sun), Stilecoom (Wed), Des Moinse (Sat), Pikes Place (Fri). And possibly the Market in Winlock too.
Francis is helping alot, he has gone to farmers markets and will be going to a wine tour, college presentation. He lives here with us and helps around the farm. He as got to make cheese and lable, weight and sell it. He is a nice young man and I think he will go far.
We introduce a new package to our sales its a sample pack consisting of Chevre, Garlic & Dill Chevre, Feta, and Marinated Feta its price range is from $10 - $20, and they are selling well.
We are milking 56 does and bottle feeding 23 kids. I am currently making cheese 3 times aweek. When we wean the kids in two weeks that will give 40 more gallons a week for that 4th batch of cheese. We have picked up a few more resturants so I am busy packaging for that too.
Well I will catch you up more in a few days.

I am BACK!

Hello everyone. Its been along time since I got on the computer to blog. Most of that was that I was sort of depressed about out situation and thought we were going to loose the farm. Its not a big deal to loose the farm, its loosing all the work we have put into it. Anyway the bank decided to give us another chance. I am here again saying things look bleak again. This time of year everything slows down and we have not enough sales to sustain the farm. So bills get unpaid and we get notices.... we pray God will bring in the money to let us keep going for one more year. Anyway so much for the sad news....
Kidding should start in about 3 weeks. We are down to about 90 goats here at the dairy. Which is alright... less hooves to trim and less feed to feed. We cleaned the barn this last week and have new shavings on the floor. We have all the baby pens now cleaned and ready for kids. We thought our first goat started labor about 1 week ago and so off to the vets we went to see if we needed a C-Section or what. We got the what..... took her home and gave her some penicillin and she is fine and now out with the herd. We have started graining in the milk parlor (1 month prior kidding) and adding our apple cider vinegar and their kelp,dolomite lime, linseed and soybean mix on the grain. Training the yearlings how to go through the parlor is such a fight. Hopefully by the time they kid they will have it down.
We were featured at Ray's Boathouse restaurant a few weeks ago... we got to talk to each table when our course came up. It was really neat.
We shipped Ali off to Texas to spend a month with her sister. So Danyel and I got to get into a routine for two. Ali is back and Danyel ships out tomorrow for her month. This is these girls vacation. Their sister and her husband are spoiling them rotten.
We are having some plumbing done today too. Our ceiling in the spare room downstairs fell .... from a leak in the bathroom upstairs. My son and husband did all they could do to fix it and now we have a plumber working on it. So we haven't' had any water all day yesterday and today. Dishes are high and can't wait to get the kitchen cleaned.
We will go out and start chores at 4:30. And I have to start dinner too.
The wind was really loud and strong last night. No damage to anything at the farm.
I also was a Grandma in October to my 8th granddaughter.... she was born on my birthday too. I got to be in the room when she was born in the pool in the birth room. How cool is that. Her name is Samantha. Mom and Dad and baby and brother are all doing fine. Nana too! (me)
Well I'll write more hopefully soon and add some pictures on too.