Wednesday, July 27, 2011

A cheese work day

I have packaged 5 restaurant orders already, all the plain feta for the weekend. And now I need to hang my chevre and I am making a batch of Grande Rosa. A tour should show up any time to visit the farm. I milked the goats this morning too. Will post more this afternoon.

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Evening at Work

I just cleaned the milk parlor and Danyel is milking tonight... Ya! Justin is out helping her and babysitting her I think. I am heading out to the processing plant to cut up some grande rosa for a restaurant and some for the market tomorrow. I also have to package marinated feta and lemon and honey chevre. I am only going to do what needs to be done tonight. I have 7 orders for this weekend... for restaurants. So tomorrow I will be busy packaging. Got my chevre made today so I will hang it tomorrow morning. I have a tour tomorrow too. Justin did all the watering tonight and even carried a bag of grain into the milk parlor. What a great Grandchild he is.
David got hay today and also hooked up the brush hog onto the tractor. He is going to teach Justin how to mow the field. Justin can't wait. He is 10 and all farm boy.

Thousand trails campground

We took the grandkids up to see grandparents Riders yesterday. They were at Thousand Trails in Centraila. The weather was kind of cool under the trees, but the pool area was warm, still no sun though. The kids spent most of thier time splashing, squirting and jumping into the water. As for the older ones we all sat around the pool watching and chatting. It was a nice break from the farm. I milked in the morning and evening and we had Girl Scout Garbage for dinner - something I learned to make when I was a leader...It was very good. Made Justin take a spitz bath as his leg. The boys have been sleeping in the tent for the last week. Sure makes the house quiet. The granddaughters slept in the house due to Danyels fall. They were happy about that anyway.
My bucks are going crazy... so many girls to pick from in the herd. We will have early babies next year. Thats good cause the resturants want thier cheese...
Markets this weekend were pretty good. Thats nice since we were feeding more mouths than normal. God always has a way. Well I am making cheese today - Chevre- 52 gallons. Its quick and easy to make. We are still having problems with getting Animal Rennet though. So I use mine very sparingly... if that is possible. I will go on ebay today and order another pint while I wait for our usual supplier to get my gallon. This has never happened before so its really strange to be in such a spot. Well have a great day... all is well at the dairy!

Sunday, July 24, 2011

The day after

Danyel dr visit was pretty simple, he gave her a muscle relaxer and said she wrenched her shoulder. That was a good report. She is feeling better and moving the arm a little more.
Today the four grandsons went to the farmers market with Papa. He had a record day selling but the boys wore him out. The girls and I relaxed until about 10am - after doing chores and milking the goats. Then we went to the store to pick up Danyels meds. - they didn't have them so we ran some more erronds and went to the dr's office and they said they would send it over again and it should be there when we get there. So we drove back to the store and they still didn't have the perscription... so Danyel told them we would get them tomorrow. We went to some garage sales on the way home and found some treasures. Shawn, my son and his girlfriend came this evening to pick up two of the six grandkids. Its way to hot to do chores yet so I think I will start dinner and feed everyone before we do chores.
Right now the two youngest grandsons are playing basketball with Papa and the three older ones are playing the Wii. And Nana is resting.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Danyel to the Dr.

David is taking Danyel to the Dr. right now to make sure something isnt broken. She did the market today and said it hurt pretty bad most of the day even being on asprin. I am heading out to clean the milk parlor and load my girls up... the grandkids will all help.. ya for the extra hands today. I took the boys and Katline to the steam train ride today and I think they had a good time... I had to drop them off and have Katline babysit the boys so I could run to Olympia and pick up the girls after market. Then had to run Katie home for her sisters Birthday party and back home - where I am now.

BBQ/ Cheese Class

Well the morning started off pretty busy. I was up at 5:30am and headed out to clean the milk parlor. One of Danyel's friends spent the night and so she did the milking for me. I had to label some cheese for Danyel to go to market and then get ready for the cheese class. I had my booklets to still put together and the house needed vaccumed, mopped and swept. Then the table and chairs put out for the class. I made lunch, Chicken Broccoli Braid. The was cooking the chicken arranging and mixing the ingredents together so that I could put it in the oven at 11:30 so we could eat on time. I had to wash dishes in the processing plant from packaging and making cheese the day before. Oh did I mention 3 of my grandsons from 14 - 7 were here too. I told them to play games down stairs and stay hid during my cheese class. Those boys were amazing they were quiet and we never heard or saw them the whole 4 hours...
The class went great, there was 10 people in the class and they all enjoyed themselves. The cheese all worked and the luch was wonderful. We took the tour of the farm and everyone was on thier way by 2pm. Then I started with Katies help to clean up the house again _ to get ready for the BBQ at 6pm. I made potatoe salad (10# of potatoes - 1 dozen eggs - 1large walla walla onion - and about 8 dill pickles). I had to unthaw the 4 pounds of hamburger and make patties. Katie was working right beside me most of the afternoon. Amazing we were ready when family started showing up. David and Danyel were at markets all day. So when David got home he was the BBQ man. I ran over and cleaned the milk parlor so the kids could milk, feed and water the goats. Boy I was so tired. Then it happened after milking was done..... Danyel fell off the manuer mountain and hit her head and hurt her shoulder.... One of the grandsons came running over and said Danyel fell and hurt herself and can't get up.. well visions of -not suger plums- danced in my head... I start yelling should I call 911 but David said no and helped Danyel up and thus we put ice on her, checked her back out and arms - nothing was broke. But she says it really hurts and so she has her arm in a sling and taking some asprin. After this mis hap, the two girls helped or actaully did the rest of the labeling and weighing of the about 80 pieces of cheese for market today. David loaded the car up for Danyel and did his own too. And then I went to bed and the girls did too. We put the boys in a tent outside...
This moring Danyel said she couldn't drive cause it hurt to much to turn her head. Its was 5:30am. Plan B... we went into action the girls all got up and we got right onto the chores, I cleaned the parlor and the girls loaded the goats and fed the rest of them. The boys got up at 6:45 and did t he watering. I finished milking the does at 7:25am and then I told the boys to eat breakfast and stay in the house so I could run the 3 of the 4 girls to Olympia to sell cheese today. Danyel is there supervising and Kiara and Katie are selling cheese and taking care of Danyel. I am now back home and Katline did a fine job of babysitting while I was gone. Now my plans for the rest of the day is to take the 5 grandchildren for a ride on the steam train in Chehalis at 1pm today. I will go and pick up the girls in Olympia as close to 3 as I can. Then back home to unload, inventory and then onto chores. I will be doing chores tonight....Danyel is kind of out of it.... I will have to do all the milking until she feels better. It looks like I might have to do Fri. and Sat. Olympia Market next week too.....
Well that is the exciting evening and morning at Blue Rose Dairy

Friday, July 22, 2011

3 of 3
tired but still moving
2 of 3
this morning and with the class. Now family is coming over for a BBQ this evening. 6 grandchildren are spending the night. I am
1 of 3
The cheese class went great. The cheese turned out and the lunch was a hit too. Katie our neighbour, came and helped with milking

Thursday, July 21, 2011

The end of the Day

Well I packaged about 150 pieces of cheese today. I just got done cleaning the parlor so Danyel can milk tonight. I bought a frozen lazana for dinner , its in now heating up. Green salad, ranch cressing and some mixed veg. and some french bread. Yum! The three grandsons did the watering and I will go do the graining of the few goats we have that don't get milked. We also have a White Irish Dexter calf she is 8 months old... she isn't white her name is Ebony - she pulled all the black from the ears and hooves of the mom and dad. I will milk her and make butter and use the cream. She is just for our use. Well I need to go finish my processing plant clean up and then I will lable and weigh the cheese while watching TV tonight. I have to also put my cheese class books together. I have 12 people coming tomorrow morning at 10am - 2pm for the cheese making class.
Just testing my new phone posts|

Starting A New.....

Hello to all, I want to start a new and start posting here rather than on facebook. You know when you get a really icky taste in your mouth and its totally awful???? I just had the experiance with facebook and I think the blog is much more fun and safer.
I am heading out to the processing plant to hang some chevre today. I have to first clean my cheese cloth and throw them in the washing machine... then hang the cheese. I didn't get done making it till about 11:30 pm last night so I have no big hurry to get it hung this morning.
I cleaned the bulk tank yesterday too. I have made 3 batches of cheese this week. 2 chevre and one feta.
Speaking of feta I need to drain it and resalt it today and then put it into the buckets into the cooler for 5 days.
I have a bunch of packaging to do today too. And then I will label and and weigh it tonight.
We are in the Olympia Farmers Market 4 days this year and we will sell all the way until Dec. 24.
We are also up at Pikes Place too, only on Fridays. Tomorrow David is just going to Seattle to deliver cheese and then come home. We are also at the Tacoma Proctor Market and the Steilicoom Market. We have picked up a bunch of resturants this season too.
We are milking about 40 does and have about 89 goats this year. We had a really bad winter sort or Spring. We bought about 20 goats from Spokane area and lost all but 5 from something that is passed like HIV from one goat to another and it effects the birthing - aborted babies and then the doe dies... Nasty stuff. So we are way down in goats... but it was Gods way to help take our herd down to a number that I can manage by myself - mostly.
Both of our last of 9 daugthers graduated this June, one stayed home to help with the farm the other flew off to Texas to go to school and help her sister by babysitting thier 1 year old, my grandson.
I am planning on going to Africa in January to help get the ball rolling on a dairy and processing plant in Rwanda. it should be fun and I already know lots of work. Don't know the time frame yet of how long I will be over there.
Well I think that is enough up date for now.... plenty more to add later.