Our Farm

Monday, May 10, 2010

Mother's Day

Yesterday was Mother's Day and I just wanted to share what my family did for me.

The boys and I started the morning by going to ACC for Sunday school and church service while Dad stayed home and made my surprise.  When we got home the house smelled of freshly baked cookies!  John, who hates to do anything in the kitchen and leaves most of the cooking up to me, had baked me oatmeal chocolate chip cookies from scratch!  I'm so happy that he took the time to do something for me that he doesn't like but knew I would.  I love you, John!

Brycen had come home from school on Thursday with a cute picture of himself that he'd decorated and a necklace he'd made for my Mother's Day gift (although he told me the necklace was his:).  Jaxon saved his gift for me for Sunday and gave it to me at lunch time.  I opened up a colorful box to find that it wasn't tissue paper that made it so colorful (the box was clear) it was the gift:  a beautiful silk scarf that he'd dyed himself!  I will be wearing the scarf and necklace (if Brycen lets me) to church next Sunday.

Thank you to my wonderful family for a nice, enjoyable, and relaxing Mother's Day!  I appreciate all of the work and thought that you put into my gifts.  I love you!

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Raw Milk = 10 lbs Lost!

As I was drinking a glass of raw milk last night, I realized something that could be a coincidence or an actual cause and effect:  Since switching from "regular" milk to raw milk I've lost 10 lbs!  For the last week or so I've noticed my jeans are so loose that I need to wear a belt now.  The other day I weighed myself and the scale showed that I had indeed lost 10 lbs.  So couldn't it be that YMCA membership we have now?  Probably not, because I only seem to get in once every week and I haven't noticed the weight loss until just recently and we've had the membership since January.  Am I eating differently?  Yes.  I'm eating more raw foods (veggies and dairy) and drinking more tea since we've switched from "regular" to raw milk about 2 months ago now.  The biggest factor in my eyes is the raw milk.  I rule out the veggies because I'm not eating more of them, I've just been eating them raw instead of cooked.  Where as with the milk, I've not only been drinking more of it, but I've been drinking the raw cream in large amounts in my tea and lattes.  Raw milk and cream naturally have more fat in them.  So shouldn't that cause me to gain more weight instead of loose weight?  I think the whole low-fat low-calorie diet craze is a big myth.  If you eat healthy fats and calories it may actually cause you to loose weight because you're not depriving your body of the essential vitamins and minerals that it needs to function properly.

For instance, if you eat feed-lot beef (fed a diet of corn and/or soy w/out much room to move around and given hormones and antibiotics) it has a higher fat content than grass-fed beef.  The things that it eats are more concentrated in its fat.  Thus when you eat it you're eating a concentrated amount of those hormones and antibiotics (as well as soy - which has been proven to mimic estrogen - and corn).  If you eat grass-fed beef, it has a lower fat content, and what fat it does have is rich in those vitamins and minerals from the grass and alfalfa that it ate.

So too with "regular" pasteurized/homogenized milk, the cow has been fed a corn/soy diet.  It's been given antibiotics and growth hormones.  Those things are going to concentrate in the fat of the cow's milk.  Then the milk is heated to a high temperature to kill off any "bad bugs" (pasteurization) which also kills the good things like beneficial enzymes, vitamins, and minerals.  This is why vitamins A and D must be added into the milk after pasteurization because any of the good things have been killed along with the bad.  Then you homogenize it, which breaks down the particles by shaking it up so much that the fat can't separate from the rest of the milk.  And then you have whole milk, 2%, 1%, and fat-free.  You'd think that fat free would be your best bet, but it's actually the worst.  From my understanding of fat free milk it has had powdered milk protein added to it (some of which contains MSG) so as to give it a higher protein content because there is no fat found in it.  I'm still not clear on the whole "fat free" concept and what goes into make it that, but I do know for a fact that they've added powdered milk protein to it.  In my opinion, no thanks!  Then you have your organic milk, which may or may not have been fed a grass-only diet.  But at least they claim not to have had hormones are antibiotics.  And lastly, you have raw milk.  Most raw milk has been fed an all-grass or mostly-grass diet.  Grass and alfalfa are high in vitamins A and D that unlike the vitamins added to "regular" milk, are easy for our bodies to digest because of their structure (again I'm not a scientist or a dr, so I can't explain the details of one structure from another).  So when you drink raw milk, you're getting all of those good vitamins, minerals, and enzymes that are naturally occurring, not added.

Did you know that cows are not designed to eat grains?  When they do it introduces E-coli into their gut which in turn raises the chance of us getting E-coli if we eat the meat or dairy from a cow that ate grains.  A grass-fed cow, on the other hand, does not have E-coli in its gut because a cow is designed by nature to eat grass and only grass which in turn does not produce a scary bacteria such as E-coli.

To sum up, grain-fed cows introduce a host of "bad" things into our bodies if we eat and drink their byproducts.  Grass-fed cows in comparison have no need for the antibiotics because they don't get sick because they're eating what they're supposed to eat.  And farmers who actually care aren't going to give them growth hormones.  Thus eating and drinking the byproducts of grass-fed cows is beneficial to our bodies.

I hope you have the chance to try raw milk.  I'm hooked on the stuff.  My husband no longer has lactose intolerant symptoms.  My kids love to drink milk now that's not flavored.  I'm planning on making home-made ice cream from the raw cream so John can enjoy ice cream again w/out taking a pill and having its side effects.  In the end, I'm in love with raw dairy and don't understand why we ever went away from it given the facts we now have.  And to top it all off, I've LOST 10 LBS! :)

Monday, May 3, 2010

Grocery Shopping Dilemma

So today I went to Costco, Fred Meyer, and Trader Joe's.  Costco and Fred Meyer were just a couple things I had to pick up before the boys got home from school.  After the boys got home and had lunch, I was about to pack them into the truck to go to the Everett Trader Joe's (as opposed to the Lynnwood one) because they have the "shopper in training" carts for kids.  Luckily, John walked in the door from running his errand as I was walking out, so he came, too.  Let me just say this:  the boys ARE NOT ready for a long shopping list of groceries in Trader Joe's yet!  If John hadn't have come with me it would have been complete and total chaos!

The real dilemma I had, though, was to buy organic, or not.  I was looking at the ground beef, and they had 3 choices:  "regular," "all natural," or "organic."  The "regular" didn't say anything special on it and was the cheapest.  The "all natural" said it was never given growth hormones or antibiotics and was free range and was a moderate price.  The "organic" was the same as the "all natural" with the addition of being grass fed and the most expensive.  So do I feed my family what I know is the healthiest choice and break our budget?  Or do I forgo the nutritional value and buy the cheapest to stay within budget?  In the end I skipped the beef all together and went with ground turkey that said "natural flavor added."  WHAT?!  What is "natural flavor"?  Why do they need to add it?!  I just want meat, and nothing else!  Even though it was the cheapest option I feel bad feeding this to my family.  I want the best for them and myself, why should I be forced to eat processed crap (because of our lack of an income at this point in time) just because I cannot afford the healthy alternatives?  I say it's the government's problem for subsidizing all of the corn and soy that's cheaper to feed the animals than it is to let them eat plain old grass.  Yes, you heard me, the US government.  I want to lobby for change...but I'm apprehensive about doing so.  The argument, "But you're just one tiny person in a sea of law makers," keeps coming to mind.  Also, how do I go about writing a good letter that will actually get read and thought about?  And, most importantly, who do I send my letter(s) to?  There must be someplace out on the internet that will answer my questions.  I must Google it.  And I mustn't let my fear stop me.  For some reason the thought of writing letter upon letter upon letter fills me with dread.  Maybe I can e-mail my concerns in?  Hopefully so, because I hate using stamps and envelopes...which is why my parents never get any pictures of the boy, but that's another story in and of itself.

Off I go to Google my questions!

Sunday, May 2, 2010

May 2, 2010

It has been one week tomorrow since John was laid off. The second he texted me about the lay off "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord" popped into my head. I have a peace about it, as hard as that may sound. We've been through this before. Last year John was laid off for 10 months. We made it through then and we'll make it through now. God hasn't forgotten us. Indeed, He has us right where He wants us at this place in time. That is the hope I hold on to, that is why I can get up in the morning and know we're going to be okay. My hope is to convey God's grace, mercy, and love through this blog.

Before John's lay off I was looking into going back to school to become a midwife and/or nutritionist. I am still holding on to making that dream a reality, I just don't know how it's going to come about or end yet. God has shown me time and time again that this is the field He wants me in, thus He will provide a way.

As for our Nourishing Traditions diet, some of it we're keeping, while some of it is being put on hold until John is working again. The are definitely keeping the raw milk. John hasn't had any lactose intolerant symptoms since we switched to raw, and the boys have been drinking much more milk than before the switch. There is one brand of sprouted bread that we all like, Dave's Killer Bread, that I'll try to keep up with. The organic produce we'll keep to as much as possible. But the organic, grass fed beef and free range soy-free chicken and other soy-free meats are just going to cost too much for us to continue on with while John is out of work.

Hopefully we can stay in the condo we're in. The boys finish pre-school this June, and it looks like IF we have to move, it won't be until after that, so that's a relief to me for the boys. The last thing I wanted to do was pull them out of school. We were going to buy the Hooked on Phonics lessons for them, but unless a job comes through, that won't be happening this summer. My project for Jaxon this summer is to teach him the basics of reading. Any thoughts and ideas on how to do this would be much appreciated!

The store is calling, time to buy more raw milk for the week!