Farm Crawl 2013

Whew.

That was a long day.

It rained and even ice slushed for a few minutes. It was cold. Wet, you know, from the raining.

Our tent wasn't set at the top correctly and leaked, pretty much right on my head.

We sold 200 packages of breakfast sausage. 8 jars of spice. A couple bags of bean mix. We ran out of business cards. We talked to folks about permaculture, Ossabaw Island pigs, milk and apple fed pork, bacon, soup making, recipes, gardening, and babywearing.

We grilled up sausage samples. We danced with our children in the rain.

It was a good day.

Our first farm crawl, in 2007, was when Lily was three years old. It was the best day. I was pregnant with Holly. I ate chevre for the first time. Lily picked apples. We saw a real beehive for the first time. Watched a kid rescue a wooly bear caterpillar from chickens. We lived in the city and were still longing for a farm. Longing is a soft word for it. We were suddenly brokenhearted at the thought of raising our children in the city. We needed this life.

In 2008 we toured farm crawl, meeting our soon to be neighbors and mentors.

2013, setting up our booth at Farm Crawl is still like a dream for us. I think the folks we were in 2007 imagined having a farm, but never having a vendor booth. We just wanted to do this for our own family. Now we teach others how to get started. That's pretty cool.

Through farm crawl we have met so many wonderful people. People from all over Iowa, people we have learned so much from, people we pass knowledge on to.

I am so grateful.

Sadly we didn't get a single picture.

Farm Crawl and New Blog Navigation

Today was the annual Farm Crawl. We've been preparing all week and very busy.

For those of you new to the blog there is a navigation tab system at the top. If you just want recipes, click on the Farmhouse Kitchen. If you only want to read about Isaac's story, and how our family lives with 22q deletion syndrome there is a tab for that too.

This blog includes all of our life, the farm, the kids, unschooling, cooking, motherhood reflections, writing about writing, and sometimes long rambling posts about body politics and feminism. That's just who I am, what I love, and I write about it. I write about all of it.

I thought about making multiple topic blogs but ultimately decided that the model of that didn't work for me. That's why you get it all here. The good, the yummy, and the barnyard.

Cheers!

Meet the Meat....

I've been thinking a lot lately about food budgets. My own especially since my two almost three year old has the appetite of a teenager. He eats almost as much as I do at a meal! So I thought I would go through our budget again and figure out where and when we can make improvements in both expense and quality.

To take it back I thought I would talk about meat first. About 7 years ago we started buying pork in bulk, whole animal. Then about 5 years ago we started buying beef that way too. Now we raise our own chickens, get a deer, and if we can afford it we also buy a lamb (this year we are raising lamb and maybe a beef too!). We also fish our pond for fresh fish and have duck and turkey now and then. All fresh, all local. That's a LOT of variety. This year if we had paid for our own pork as a customer, the cost for 175 lbs of meat would have been approx 614$. Our pastured beef side was $850. So pretend that we didn't get all the other meat and just bought beef and pork in bulk....that's 1464$.... 121$ per month, $35 a week for enough really good meat to host several large parties and serve T-Bones and Iowa Chops and our family eats really well, not just on sale poor quality ground meat and cheap cuts.

I get to be creative. I get to learn about new cuts of meat and how to prepare them. I get to use my heirloom cast iron skillets. My family eats well. We eat together. We eat at home.

That last bit saves us a lot of money. We eat at home. Quite often, the cuts of meat and quality of meat we eat here at home is better than what is served at the restaurants we can afford. I won't pretend I am a sous chef, but I know I have put on the table meals that were better than Cracker Barrel or Applebees menu fare. I know my Iowa Chops rival the State Fair on a stick variety (and those are really good!). Plus, this is for weeknight fare and regular breakfasts not special occasion meals.

I also know that we are paying premium price for our bulk meat and it is still cheaper than store bought. Easily found in our area are cheaper bulk rates, for example we charge $2.75 per lb hanging weight for our pork and a neighboring farmer charged $0.60 cents per lb last year. I cannot figure out how he can charge that AND pay for feed for the animal since our feed costs are double that at least.

Gun Play

My kids don't really do gun play yet, but recently there was some discussion in our local group about how natural it is- that boys will make guns out of sticks and dolls if they don't have the actual toys.

I call bullshit.

It is not human nature to play with guns. It is not part of our being or a boy's natural being. According to this website, the first gun was in China in 1232.  It wasn't until much later, hundreds of years later that guns made it to the rest of the world and until the industrial revolution era that they became more commonplace of a tool and part of military repitoir. So what did boys play with before that? If it was part of nature, an intrinsic part of their being, then they would have been playing "Bang Bang You're Dead", right?

It's not that simple. What is part of human nature is to imitate roles in our society, especially roles that are held in high regard. In earlier times that would have been the warrior (think knives, swords, clubs), the hunter, the shamen/priest/wizard......anyone that displays power and gains respect. Our times and nature are no different.

The problem isn't necessarily what the weapon of choice is but rather what the kids are learning about its power and use. Gun are now mostly used for military application, law enforcement, and crime. Rarely does entertainment (movies, tv) show self defense, hunting, or museum quality collecting/art. Gun play isn't about providing the family or community with food or even about protecting each other FROM harm- it is about harming other people.

I was watching Monk and Bones on netflix and it occurred to me: we glorify and respect the bad guys. We honor and give power to their genius. They almost outsmart the good guys or it wouldn't be a show. 99% of bad guys are not super evil geniuses but anyone watching wouldn't know that. On the shows often they are funny, attractive, and really smart. Their victims are not. What message does this send us? It is not reality. In fact, most bad guys are desperate people and not very bright and yet many of them get away with all sorts of crime before if ever getting caught, walking away when they do after a little time or fine. It's not reality we are seeing but children, how believe in Santa and the Tooth Fairy, think it is. The see it, they play it, they respect it because we do. That is problem.