Archive for Family Stuff

Brutus the Hog – Wordless Wednesday

This is Brutus the Hog. He is a heritage breed Tamworth pig. We met him on one of our trips to a local farm to purchase turkeys. His owners said he climbs into his water trough every day to do this (see photo below) and makes a ton more work – because the trough has to be washed out every day rather than weekly or however often the farmer deemed best. We thought it was hilarious that Brutus did this.

Brutus the hog in a trough_edit

Brutus the Hog_edit

Then what does our cow do a week later? Yes, Miss Moo climbed in her 25 gallon water trough and cracked it! Argh! Those stock tanks are not cheap. Thankfully, we had purchased ours used, but still they are hard to come by in good shape even when purchasing them used. So she now has to use her hay bucket for water.

My husband is interested in raising some heritage hogs. They are really fun to observe. Not sure at what point we’ll get to raising hogs but thinking of all the bacon we’d get from a hog makes our mouth water!


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Sponsored: Headfirst! Expert Advice on Lice – A New Head Lice Resource for Parents

“The below content is sponsored by Sanofi Pasteur’s Headfirst! Expert Advice on Lice campaign on behalf of Mom Central Consulting. I received a promotional item as a thank you for participating.”

It’s summer and with that comes camp season. Kids playing in close quarters may lead to a common hard-to-treat problem: head lice. If your child brings home an extra louse house
guest (or two) after camp, stay calm and know there are resources available to help.

Web

Headfirst! Expert Advice on Lice
is an educational website created by head lice experts (and moms) for other moms, families and communities to learn about head lice—what they are,
what they look like and how to treat them.

The site offers a variety of tools including:

The How to Lose the Lice Guide, with a handy checklist to save time and reduce stress when battling head lice

The Headfirst! Lice Experience video allows you to choose your experience, whether it be you’re not sure you have lice, or you just want to get rid of them:

So if you’re trying to get rid of head lice post-camp, or a parent who always likes to be prepared for next season, visit Headfirst! Expert Advice on Lice for more information.


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Happy Family #hfbrightside



Readers familiar with our blog and family know that we value healthy eating and living. We try to promote products our family is personally interested in and enjoys. We review a lot of green, eco-friendly and organic products because we want to use products that are safe for the whole family. As beginning organic farmers, we desire to eat organic foods, including snacks, because we want to provide only the best food possible for our children. Their future health depends on it.

Happy Family

Happy Family Products_edit

Happy Family offers organic meals and snacks for infants and toddlers (older children will love them too – ours did!). They are also great for traveling.

Happy Family products are a wholesome start for babies and are organic meals and snacks that your toddler will love, ours did!

Happy Family Puffs

Specific Happy Family products include: Happy Baby, Happy Tot, Happy Bellies, Happy Puffs, Happy Yogis, Happy Squeeze and more. Our children loved everything we tried and have asked for more! If you want to learn more about their full line of products or specific nutritional information, visit www.HappyFamilyBrands.com

Happy Family – Bright Side Campaign

As parents of eight children, we know how hard it can be at times to get a child to eat what is put before them. We do not require them to eat a plateful of something they do not like but they have to at least try a little bit of it. We learned that the hard way with our oldest child when she was little and now our youngest children thank us (or maybe not) for our foresight. (wry smile). We actually made her eat a bowlful of broccoli for fussing about it. Amazingly, she loves it to this day. However, we no longer require a full portion of anything be eaten if a child does not like it! That’s our “Bright Side” story because it did end well for all of us and we can laugh about it now. Though at the time it was an ordeal.

Happy Family’s Bright Side Campaign is a campaign that shares:

Stories in a a humorous light on food and feeding challenges that parents have through sharing funny stories told by top bloggers that are then acted out by improv troupe the Upright Citizen’s Brigade.

Happy Family wants YOU to share your personal “Bright Side” or funny feeding stories about food and the challenges that come with raising your children. Part of this campaign includes a sweepstakes. Happy Family will pick a funny feeding story to award $20K towards a child’s college education (the rules and regulations are on their Facebook page). To share your story or to view the contest rules visit: https://www.facebook.com/HAPPYFAM/app_512040132171168

For an example of a funny feeding story, watch the video below of Fellow blogger’s, Jim Lin from Busy Dad Blog, special feeding tactics – be prepared to laugh!

And don’t forget to share your own funny feeding story on Happy Family’s Facebook page for a chance to win $20K towards your child’s education! https://www.facebook.com/HAPPYFAM/app_512040132171168 . If you share your story or link on Twitter, be sure to use the hashtag #hfbrightside.


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Turkeys, Turkeys and More Turkeys – Wordless Wednesday

Last week one of our customers on our farm Facebook page shared this video:

I was laughing a hearty laugh by the end because we technically started with a flock of 30 laying hens….Well, we actually started with a 27 year old horse, but he was not onsite until THIS year. Then we got our dog, our turkeys, rabbits, ducks, cats, a cow…..and there we have it a complete farm!

Since we lost 70% of our Narragansett turkeys, I went on a hunt for more locally. I found nine poults, plus five eggs, which we are hatching out. An Amazon gift card helped pay for an incubator. You know you are farm-crazed when your spare money and gift cards are spent on farm stuff! We also have some Midget White eggs in the incubator too. Our hen, Brownie, is also sitting on three. I want to see if she can hatch some herself since she’s so broody.

Here are our 6 week old Narragansetts, probably closer to 8 weeks now, we purchased from a local farm who hatches out their own eggs, quite successfully I might add:

FFR Narragansetts 1
The first two…

FFR Narragansetts 2
The last two…

Then we got 2-3 week old Narragansett poults a week and a half ago from a little farm that also hatches out their own eggs:

FFR Narragansetts 3

This next photo is of Junior holding one of the 2-3 week old poults:

FFR Jr. with Narragansetts 4

Our Bourbon Red turkeys have finally started laying. I believe we have a 2-3 eggs to add to the incubator, making that a total of 13-14. We’ll see how many hatch.

Never thought I’d become a heritage breed turkey farmer, but here I am with 25 turkeys, plus the additional 13-14. Turkeys, turkeys, and more turkeys! They sure will be tasty this winter!


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Flourish Magnetic Schedule Review & Giveaway

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


Flourish Magnetic Schedule Review

Do you desire to be more organized before school starts? Is summer getting away from you without getting daily tasks accomplished? I discovered a handy little tool to help me keep our children on task and to know what to expect each day in our daily routine. It’s the Flourish Magnetic Schedule.

It is very easy to use. Open it up and stick the magnet on the back of the main card, put it on the refrigerator and add the task magnets in your preferred order….ta-da! Done!

Our children like to put the magnets back up after their little brother initially took them all down and stole the task magnets! So far it is staying in place and after the novelty Junior (our youngest) has left the magnetic schedule alone.

Both the children and I like to work with lists for daily tasks and scratch them off when complete. This magnetic schedule allows us to use less paper and gives the younger children who cannot read a little visual of what they need to do.

We’ve only had the magnetic schedule for a couple of days but I like it. The magnets and schedule are made of sturdy material. My hope is it helps the children have something to refer to and learn what needs to be done when and where they should be. I haven’t added any times or anything. I try to be flexible or else I get bogged down by the actual schedule.

Magnetic Schedule for Kids 1

Not only does Flourish have this product but also other products helpful to all moms – because the products have been created by moms.

About Flourish

Moms Flourish is a new direct sales company providing innovative products for moms and kids. To make life just a little easier. Moms can also earn a little extra money for their families by joining for as little as $59.

Flourish Giveaway

Right now there’s a contest going on, which ends August 7th, the winner will be announced during the Twitter party on August 8th at 6pm PT/8pm CST/9pm ET #momsflourish. You can enter the giveaway below or visit their Facebook page. Look at all the products offered in the giveaway!

Prize_Flourish_Aug8

a Rafflecopter giveaway


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100 Baby Chicks: Cornish Rock and Freedom Rangers

Another big day here at the Gould farm. 100 baby chicks arrived…all ALIVE at that. That’s impressive. We were expecting the worst to be honest, especially when the Postal worker mentioned they were not doing very well when we received the call. These cuties are just a day old and made their journey in the 90 degree temperatures we’ve been experiencing here in Chicagoland.

We purchased 50 more Freedom Rangers, which did really well growth wise, except for that last day, and of course our first batch’s journey was not quite so successful. Here’s to hoping and praying we don’t lose a single one! Freedom Ranger broilers take 12 weeks to mature, so are a little slower growing than their counterparts, the White Cornish Rock.

FFR Second Batch of Broilers Collage

The White Cornish Rock are what you would find in the grocery store. These will take about 8 weeks to mature and be ready to be processed. You will never taste a better chicken until you’ve tried free range, pastured chicken. I don’t want our family to go back to store bought chicken after tasting our first batch of Freedom Rangers. We’ve tasted friend’s pastured chicken and that is pretty much what got us turned on to raising our own.

Our children delight in the arrival of new little fur babies.

Here’s to truly all natural, farm fresh poultry! Cannot wait to have a freezer full of these…yummy!


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Jamba Juice Review

I received this product for free from the sponsor of the Moms Meet (TM) program. May Media Group LLC, who received it directly form the manufacturer. As a Moms Meed (TM) blogger, I agreed to use the product and post my opinion on my blog. My opinions do not necessarily reflect the opinions of May Media Group LLC or the manufacturer.

JambaLogo-PDFX-Prime-CMYK

We’ve been on a journey to improve our eating habits and quality of food ever since our children were little and we learned about the harmful affects of dyes and preservatives found in mainstream food. We don’t always get it right but growing our own food is certainly helping us move in the right direction, as well as increase the nutritional value of a lot of the food we eat.

Our children are not that picky. We’ve always required them to eat at least some of the food they say they hate or don’t like. We also find they are more open to trying new veggies if we grow them ourselves. I love the summer when they can just munch on fresh picked vegetables straight from their little garden patch! Remember, they even eat green smoothies!

We recently had the opportunity to try Jamba Juice. Jamba Juice is a restaurant retailer offering better-for-you foods, including fruit and veggie juices and smoothies.

Jamba Juice

 

jamba-juice-smoothies

Did you know:

  • Only 8 percent of Americans achieve their recommended target for fruit in an average day
  • Only 6 percent of individuals meet their recommended target for veggies in an average day
  • 1 percent of adults and 2 percent of children meet both their recommended fruit and veggies servings each day.

**Source: State if the Plate: 2010 Study of America’s Consumption of Fruit & Vegetables

 

Jamba Juice Review

 

Jamba Juice Review Kids_edit

We tried Jamba Juice’s new Tropical Harvest™ Smoothie and the Jamba Kids™ Berry Beet It!™ Smoothie.

The Tropical Harvest™ Smoothie contains: Mangos, peaches, yellow vegetable juice (sweet potato, carrot, butternut squash), passion mango juice, ice and is only 230 calories.

The Berry Beet It!™ Smoothie contains: Strawberries, mangos, bananas, mixed berry juice, carrots, beets, broccoli, spinach, kale, lettuce and is only 190 calories.

My children loved the Berry Beet It!™ Smoothie. All of them drank it with gusto. They even liked the Tropical Harvest™ Smoothie. I, on the other hand, am not a huge fan of mangos. However, it grew on me as I drank it. To me the mango really came through. Otherwise, I actually preferred the Berry Beet It!™ Smoothie.

Jamba Juice Review_edit

These smoothies were very flavorful and made a great treat on a hot day. The only thing we didn’t care about was the price. They are pricey. We realize we are paying for quality but it’s an ouchie on the pocket book when a smoothie outing costs our family over $30! They sure are tasty though!

Feel free to check Jamba Juice out on Facebook.


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Summer on the Farm – Wordless Wednesday

We are having an extremely busy summer. So busy that I am taken aback that we are nearly half way through July! Summer has always been my favorite season, though I enjoy the others. My birthday is during the summer and my mom always made birthday time FUN! From sleepovers to camp outs to a day on the lake, I always had a blast. Summer on the farm is fun too or not so fun in some instances, as we’ve had a couple of disasters (our sized disasters that is, as we realize there are much worse disasters happening). We lost 17 of our 29 broilers on the way to processing due to them overheating – expensive. Our new batch of turkeys were shipped over the 4th of July and we lost over half of them. Now I am struggling to find a local source for turkeys to save on the stress of having them shipped.

On the brighter side, our egg business is growing. We have been selling out of eggs for the past 3 weeks. So we started to increase our flock again. We purchased 6 month old Rhode Island crosses, much like our Red Sex Links. Not a heritage breed like our original flock but very good producers. We also purchased 13 Silkies. They have poofy hair and feet. Our youngest daughter asked for the baby chicks, who are not so little, so she’s been taking care of them. The mamas are very broody so we are hoping to hatch out some more eggs! Here’s to hoping for the best.

FFR 6 Month Old Laying Hens_edit

FFR Silkies_edit

Due to the shipping fiasco with our turkeys, we purchased a breeding trio of Bourbon Red turkeys. This is a heritage breed and may be a little bigger than our Midget White turkeys. We now have five “pet” turkeys. Our neighbor hatched two of our Midget White eggs and we would have had an additional two turkeys, but during a mating session the Tom smothered them beneath Brownie, our hen. :( Lots of death around our farm lately. One of my children’s words not mine. But I quite agree.

FFR Bourbon Red Turkeys_edit

Animals are not the only thing that has been keeping us busy. Berry picking has too. We found some mulberry bushes (more like trees to be honest) at the back of our property and we’ve been picking those pretty regularly.

FFR Mulberries_edit

Then we have been visiting area berry farms to pick strawberries and raspberries. Next on the list is blueberries! Next year we are planning on planting more berries here on the farm, as most of our plants did not produce much due to us moving them from the townhouse to the farm in the spring.

We have also been working hard to get all our fall planting done or most of it, as we will be planting more greens in a month’s time. We bought some transplants from friends’ farms to make up for our spring greenhouse disaster, which will hopefully help us have some veggies in late July/early August. The pepper plants are from one friend’s farm in Wisconsin. They were a little stressed since we did not get them planted right away. Our little ones even help in the garden.

FFR Pepper Plants_edit

We enjoy growing our own organic meat and vegetables, but it certainly is not without its challenges and hard work!

How’s your summer going?


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Wood Pallet Herb Garden – Wordless Wednesday

Wood Pallet Herb Garden – Wordless Wednesday

FFR Pallet Herb Garden
If you click on the photo it’s not so blurry. I don’t know why the editing program does that to photos!

This post was inspired by http://www.repeatcrafterme.com/2013/05/wooden-pallet-herb-garden.html?showComment=1372278599739&m=1 but I did not originally hear about it from her. I can’t even remember where I learned of this unique way to recycle pallet and plant a wood pallet herb garden. All I remember is seeing the idea and liking it. Then when we got our bags of soil, still on a wood pallet, I told the family I wanted to keep the wood pallet for an herb garden.

This was very easy to do. I just took a small roll of landscaping fabric and stapled it to the bottom of the wood pallet. Then my husband and I filled it up with about 2.5 bags of organic soil mix (sorry cannot remember the size of the bags right now), added some perlite and then planted our herbs.

We planted from left to right: rosemary, chives, curly leaf parsley, oregano and basil in the last two rows. These plants all came from a friend’s farm. She specializes in transplants, has a greenhouse; and since we never got our herbs planted from seed we got these from her. I’ll have to let you know how well the plants grow in this wood pallet herb garden, as this is the first time we’ve tried growing something this way.

We still have fennel, more parsley and oregano to plant, as well as all our fall planting…amidst everything else – one monthly market, a weekly market and possibly a corporate market for just five weeks this summer. Oy!

So much to do and so little time….We cannot wait to cook with our own herbs and share them with our CSA members (Consumer Supported Agriculture) and customers! Here’s to hoping the plants yield enough for all.


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Wordless Friday: Family Circle


I did write for permission to use this.

I’m starting a new trend with a Wordless Friday post. I needed something fast and this has been sitting in drafts for such a time as this. I love Family Circle comics. Don’t you? Real life at its finest. Can you relate?


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