March 2018 – Living de Good Life

A Girl is a Girl is a Girl

If you are a girl/woman, do you like to go to the beauty parlor to have your hair done? I do! It’s so nice to sit back in a chair and have someone wash, cut and style your hair and all you have to do is sit and relax! Do you know that on some level cows are like that too?

We have two jersey cows for milk. About this time of year, they begin shedding and need to be brushed. This morning, Mocha was laying in her stall after the milking was done. She looked so cute so when I finished milking Jersey, I went in to love on her a little. I knelt down beside her; she was so loving and docile and it was then I realized how much she is already shedding. I began combing her with the curry comb and it was obvious how much she enjoyed it. I brushed everything I could reach and then without warning, she suddenly stood up so I could get the rest of her. As went from side to side, she kept watching me to make sure I wasn’t leaving. She enjoyed it so much.

A couple summers ago, our girls were standing in the barnyard and I began brushing Mocha. She stood so still which was abnormal. Our other cow at the time, Heidi, came up to see what I was doing to Mocha. She tried resting her head on Mocha’s head which made it nearly impossible for me to brush Mocha. She tried to push Mocha out of the way so she could have her turn. Mocha wasn’t going to allow that to happen and stood firm. Soon I realized that Heidi was standing behind Mocha, like she had gotten in line behind her, waiting for her turn. It was our Bovine Hair Salon!

It’s funny because Mocha is pretty persnickety when it comes to what she wants and doesn’t want. If I was just going to come up and pet her while she was in the pasture, she wouldn’t want anything to do with me. However, if I have a brush or the curry comb in my hand and the girl in her shows up! Regardless of species, we girls enjoy being pampered!

My Journey to a Healthier Me

I have had quite a long journey through many scary and painful experiences to reach my current state of health. I have learned a lot over the past few years and I hope by sharing my story, my experiences and the knowledge I gained by them, information on products and ingredients, and recipes for healthier eating, that I can encourage you on your own journey to better health.

My digestive issues began after I had knee surgery and was given oxycodone for the pain, which was excruciating at times. I didn’t realize it then, but for some reason it seems that the oxycodone was the beginning of my digestive problems. It was so acidic and because I was healing from surgery, I was very sedentary. I began experiencing such burning and piercing pain in my upper abdomen that it totally immobilized me and at times the pain was so intense that it caused me to pass out.

These attacks went on for awhile so I finally made an appointment with my family’s conventional medicine physician. She ordered several tests and I received a call late on evening from her telling me that I needed to contact this specific surgeon THE NEXT DAY and schedule surgery to have my gallbladder out. However, before I made that call, I began doing some of my own research and realized that my symptoms did not match the symptoms of a diseased gallbladder.

It was then a friend of mine who was being treated naturally for her digestive issues told me about her doctor, Dr. Lewis. I made an appointment with him immediately and after reading my ultrasound results, he discovered that although I did have some small stones, my gallbladder was not diseased. He diagnosed me with a sliding hiatal hernia. There was a small tear in my esophagus and when I would bend over, especially after recently eating, my stomach would slide up into that tear and get caught, causing an esophageal spasm which produced heart attack-like symptoms. My digestive system was so inflamed that I couldn’t even lift a gallon of milk or a laundry basket and I walked around feeling like I had a cinder block affixed to my stomach.

These attacks began happening more frequently and the episodes began lasting longer and longer. One Sunday, an attack began while I was sitting in church and continued through the afternoon until I could no longer stand the pain. I texted my new doctor and even though he was at a convention, he responded and told me to go to Urgent Care and get an “anti-spasmodic cocktail”. Shortly after drinking that concoction, I had relief from pain. Needless to say I carried a small bottle of this cocktail with me at all times for a many months.

Dr. Lewis provided me with a chart of anti-inflammatory foods as well as a chart of acidic/alkaline foods. With the implementation of these two charts, along with some natural supplements to help heal my digestive system, I began the path of healing my gut. This new way of eating was like stepping into a different world. I was overwhelmed! But, I knew that I had no choice but to learn how to eat differently if I wanted to get better and heal my body.

I stopped eating all grain: no wheat flour, no rice or corn products (many people don’t realize corn is a grain and not a vegetable). I also stopped eating refined sugar including organic cane sugar and refined sugar. You may recognize the term “paleo”. I didn’t know the term at the time and several years ago there were absolutely no products available to aid this kind of diet. As a result, I began to heal and have now been four years without an attack. I not only have been able to resume the “mom” tasks, I now live on my farm and do all kinds of manual labor. I am thankful to be a long way from the woman who couldn’t do laundry or lift a gallon of milk.

I want to be able to share the knowledge I have gained so that it may help someone else. There are so many common cooking ingredients that are not beneficial and may even negatively impact your health and digestion. I will share ingredients, brands, recipes and sources I have come to trust. When I started this journey I wasted a lot of money and effort on recipes that just didn’t make an edible item.

I hope that you will find the information shared here to be helpful and I hope that you will share comments if you find something is helpful to you.

Good Gifts

If you are a parent, you know from experience that the good things we do for and give to our children are not always appreciated by them. Perhaps this is because their immature and inexperienced perception is short-sighted, or maybe we have just raised ungrateful children.

Take the gift of protection, for example. Now, I am not talking about the crazy kind where you lock your kids up till they are 32 years old! But, the kind where their environment, friends, activities and exposures are carefully monitored to allow them to grow happy, healthy and wise. Instead of the thwarting of rights and freedoms, protection is a gift.

From the parent’s perspective, good gifts sometimes come with a hefty price. I will use my family as an example. Due to several circumstances in my extended family and some knowledgable people God put in our lives, we began to explore and eventually pursue a more healthy way of eating. Part of that included less desserts and fewer processed foods. Also included in that change of life was the desire to raise our own food, as much as possible, thereby knowing exactly what the animals were being fed and how they were being cared for. Our desire to be “country folk” proceeded this change of life but as we educated ourselves, the two walked hand-in-hand.

Along with country life and farm animals comes chores. Now, I don’t know about you, but would any child choose the life of chores if they could choose for themselves? But, I am convinced that the hardship of living in the country and raising our own chicken, eggs, beef and milk is a good gift we have chosen to give our children. They may not realize it while they are young but I know there are many life-long benefits to this life besides better health: a healthy work ethic, fresh air and exercise, and learning to care for someone besides themselves being just a few such benefits.

The Truth of God’s Word, and specifically the words of Jesus Himself in Matthew 7:9-11 says, “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone: Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” Since I know that my children don’t always see the gifts I give to them as good gifts, I wonder how many times do I have the same response to the good gifts that my heavenly Father gives to me? We can’t always see the benefit of the gift at the time but that’s where trust and faith come into play, knowing and believing that Romans 8:28 is true when it says “And we know that all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Just as we want our children to trust us, so God says that we can trust him, even if our circumstance doesn’t seem like a gift at the time.

Then there are the gifts the come along that are obvious gifts! Some examples might be a new and better job, a pay raise, healing from an illness, an answer to a specific prayer, protection from a potentially hazardous situation, and the list goes on and on. James 1:17 says “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” When these obvious gifts rain down on us, do we stop to thank the Giver of those good and perfect gifts?

So whether the gifts we receive are obvious gifts or whether they are gifts in disguise, 1 Thessalonians 5:16 says “Rejoice always“…ALWAYS! Verse 18 of the same chapter says “…give thanks in all circumstances.” Just as our children cannot always see the goodness of the gifts we give at the time we give them, so it is the same with us as believers and God’s gifts. This is a life of faith, so trusting and thanking God for the good gifts should be an act of praise and worship that we offer instead of grumbling and complaining.

I hope you have a great day and let’s remember to be thankful for the gifts that come our way today, whether they are obvious gifts or gifts in disguise.

Can’t Help But Smile!

Have you ever just been doing your thing…easy or hard..and realized you are smiling involuntarily? Well, I have! In fact, it happens often to me here on de Good Life Farm. I thought I might share with you some of the things that make me smile because this morning, again, I caught myself smiling as I went about morning chores.

Usually, the first smile in the morning happens when I look in at our sleeping goldens…sometimes Beau is laying over by Belle in her kennel; sometimes he and Lacey are laying together; but usually, Beau lays right by the door to the milkroom. I think he does this so that when anyone has to go through that door in the morning to do barn chores, he will have to be awakened because no one can come in or out of that door without him having to move and he will lay right back down there, even if it means he has to move ten times!

As I walk to the barn, I look over at the west pasture where Caramel, her sister, Truffle and her uncle, Oreo are currently staying. They are so adorable. I always talk to them on my way by and as I call each name, they turn and look at me. It is impossible for me not to smile when interacting with the calves.

Mocha is the next smile-maker. First, her face is the cutest bovine face I have ever seen. That alone, makes me smile! Then, she has this habit of standing as high as she can get on her hay pile which increases her height by at least a foot or so. I ask her if she is playing “Queen of the Hill”. She stands there and watches everything that’s going on in the barn. She knows eventually she will be getting new hay and watches intently until that happens. If we open the “window” on her stall, she will stick her head and neck out as far as she possibly can and it is absolutely so adorable, I can’t help but smile at her!

Sometimes when I am milking Mocha, she will turn around and just watch me, but most of the time she stands calmly, just chewing her cud, patiently waiting (most of the time) until she is free to eat her hay. Just watching her standing there makes me smile. Sometimes, she is not so patient…trying to reach the hay pile if it was left close enough for her to reach. Then, I am definitely not smiling because I find myself doing one of two dances: The Bovine Two-Step (moving back and forth two steps at a time to keep up with her moving) and the Milk Stool Shuffle (moving my stool over and over trying to reposition as she moves). Neither of them bring a smile to my face until hours later and I imagine what it would look like if it had been video recorded!

After milking, I always go into the pasture to love on the calves and Caramel. For some reason, Caramel has grown somewhat timid…but she is so very interested in how much Oreo and Truffle love the attention from me that she slowly and slyly saunters over in a “don’t notice me”-kind of way and gets close enough so that I can rub her nose or her chin or neck. That definitely makes me smile!

Watching Oreo run down the pasture with his legs kicking up so high that I can see his white cream filling (the white patch on his belly) when he is running makes me smile every time! It is so precious! He is getting so big but runs and plays like he is still a young calf.

I’m sure my neighbors must think I am a crazy cow lady because I can’t leave in my car without putting down my window(s) and talking to whomever is in the pasture. It takes me forever to leave because I have to call to each one individually and then watching them turn to my voice as I say their name makes my day! Then, when I return home, just seeing those precious bovine in my pastures brings a smile to my face.

Watching our golden retrievers run and play with each other is so much fun. But what REALLY makes me smile is watching Belle run circles around Beau. She is so stinking fast and she loves to tantalize him. She will run up to him with a stick in her mouth just to tempt him to chase her. When he falls for it (and he does multiple times during each playtime), she takes off like lightning and leaves him in the dust. Sometimes Beau will find a stick Belle hasn’t found yet but as soon as she realizes he has a stick, she zooms up to him and before he even knows what has happened, she has retrieved the stick from his mouth and it is now in hers and she runs away with it! She can carry at least three good-sized sticks in her mouth at once. Oh, and Lacey! She plays with them for awhile right in the thick of it, then she sits with her back to them like their behavior is so disgusting and she is too good to be a part of it. Their antics bring more than a smile to my face: more like eruptive laughter!

Then there are other things that make me smile from time to time: a fat robin hunting a stray worm; a cotton-tailed bunny hurrying across the path in front of me; a gorgeous pink and purple-striped sunrise; the first flower of spring popping through the ground; the first bud on the tree; and the list goes on and on.

One of the cutest things that made me smile this week was Belle and Truffle. It isn’t a frequent thing that we get to observe two species interacting with each other; most of the time the canines and the bovines keep to themselves. But the youngsters of each species are definitely drawn to each other. Yesterday I was in the pasture loving on Oreo and the dogs were playing in the yard. I turned around to see Belle hopping and pouncing around, putting her nose to the ground trying to get Truffle to play with her…and the amazing thing was that Truffle was nearly imitating Belle’s antics back at her…head down and tapping her front hooves on the ground, hopping around back at her. Keep in mind that there is an electric polytape between them but Belle’s desire to play with Truffle was almost more than she could stand and I was concerned she was going to go right through the electric fence.

This life we have chosen is not an easy life. In fact, sometimes it is down-right excruciatingly difficult but, as long as I can still catch myself smiling involuntarily, I know I am exactly where I am meant to be.

IT’S MOVING TIME

I am excited to announce that I have begun my blog at a new address…one where I hope to gain more followers and eventually make some money!!? Anyway, I will no longer be writing here, so wanted to make sure to give you my new address and ask you to begin following me over there. It is:

http://livingdegoodlife.com

I will have some new categories for you to enjoy. Additionally, I am currently in process of moving all of my past posts to the new site. Please tell your friends about my blog if you think they would enjoy it!

Hope to see you over there soon!

Diane

Spring?

We are officially enjoying the second day of Spring, however no one here on the farm really believes it! Trudging through the snow to the barn for morning milking is the same as it was in December or January other than the fact that my purple and yellow crocuses are peeking through the white blanket of snow.

The dogs are reliving winter by rolling in the snow and making snow angels. The cattle even love the snow. I saw Oreo kicking up his heels just this morning having a blast! And, Mocha! Oh, Mocha! She got in trouble (again) last night because “someone” failed to shut the stall door completely while mucking her stall and she embraced the opportunity while backs were turned to push the door open with her nose and run into the barnyard and frolic in the snow! I wish I could have seen her! She is such a bovine/kid at heart!

But however fun it is…this farmer girl is ready for Spring weather, not just a date on the calendar! I hear we might have another round of the white stuff, but I am going to hold out hope that March will go out like a lamb because it certainly came in like a lion and has roared the entire month so far!

Welcome to my new blog!

If you have been following me on my other site, you should know that eventually those posts will be transferred here to this one. I am so excited to begin this new journey! It is a long-time dream come true!

This site will include more more topics but the stories of our farm will continue! How could I NOT write about our sweet animals and their antics? But, also included in this blog will be other topics like: my favorite grain-free recipes, healthy living including grain-free recipes, natural remedies and my favorite essential oils. I will also write about our journey as breeders and raisers of Golden Retrievers.

I hope you enjoy reading what I have to say because I will certainly enjoy sharing with you!

Do cows wear watches?

As another Daylight Savings Time looms in the near future (why 2 A.M.? Does anyone actually get up and set their alarm for 2:00 to “spring” ahead? Does anyone feel like “springing ahead” at 2 A.M.?), I thought you might wonder about bovine and other animals whose routines revolve around a specific time of day.

Well, here is the evidence on our little farm: At 7:45 A.M., when I arrive in the barn, both Mocha and Jersey are standing in their stalls looking at me, almost as if to say, “Where have you been? Do you know what time it is?” (I can almost visualize them impatiently tapping their right front hoof on their left front leg as if their were wearing a watch!) So, I go about the business of milking Mocha, same as every morning, as I finish, I head over to Jersey’s stall and she is standing in the milking position as if she were already tied up again, as if she knew “it was time.”

After milking Jersey, I ready the wagon for the trip back to the house with buckets of liquid white gold…and the calves begin mooing. Now it’s their turn for some loving and, they hope, a trip to the pasture. Do they know what time it is?

During the summer, when the girls are in the pasture all the time, as milking time draws near, they stand at the gate, staring at the house, and if they do not see me coming toward the barn, they begin calling to me…LOUDLY! Again, how do they know what time it is? You might think it is because their udders are full and they want to be milked. Well, no! The last couple of days they have been in the pasture in the afternoon and around 5:00 they are standing and staring at the house, mooing for me to come out. The difference here is that they are not being milked at 5:00 or 6:00 anymore since I have been working for weeks to transition them to one morning milking. So, that is not why they are mooing. Can they tell time? Where are they hiding their watches?

So maybe it’s just the cows, you say? Well, no. Yesterday afternoon, I was heading to the barn and the calves saw or heard me and ran all the way from the front pasture to the gate where they expected me to meet them to bring them into the barn for the evening. Maybe they wear watches?

And our golden retrievers…do they wear watches? Well, today they went outside for their morning romp at 7:45 A.M. Tomorrow, it will be 8:45 A.M. Do you think they will think “Oh, OK! The clocks have changed so we have to wait another hour!” Or, will they be fidgeting and whining because they think we forgot them? And, when we take them outside last thing this evening before bed, will they understand that today it’s 10:00 P.M. but tomorrow it will be 11:00 P.M. I think not!

Tomorrow, when the people of our state (wish we lived in a state that doesn’t observe the ridiculous practice of Daylight Savings Time) turn our clocks ahead and struggle to adjust once again to getting up in the dark when our bodies know it is really 4:45 A.M. but the clocks says 5:45 A.M.; eat when the clock says its 6:00 P.M. but we aren’t hungry yet because yesterday this was only 5:00 P.M.; and when we attempt to go to bed at 10:30 P.M. when yesterday it was only 9:30 P.M., we can tell ourselves all the reasons that we must adjust and all the benefits of Daylight Savings Time.

But, what about the cows? When I do not show up to milk until a whole hour later…will they know why and understand? When they come into the barn a whole hour later, will they understand? Nope! I do not think so! Whether they wear it on their leg or it is hidden deep inside of their bodies somewhere, I am convinced that my bovines have a watch whereby they can keep tabs on me and know whether I am adhering to our unspoken agreement to milk and feed on a specific schedule!

I am contemplating rebelling and NOT adhering to this ridiculous practice this year, but instead attempting to continue on the same standard time so that the cows and dogs do not have to endure this adjustment. However, how do I live on Eastern Standard Time with the animals and live on Daylight Savings Time with my family so that my husband and son aren’t an hour late for work and ball practice? What a dilemma!

Month: March 2018