Goat Midwife

I'm often asked why I became a midwife.  My first exposure to birth was when I was twenty and I let a rescued pregnant cat birth in my closet.  I was hooked on the miracle of life; taken with every aspect of pregnancy and childbirth.  The love the mother had for her kittens made my heart joyful.  It was right around that time I decided to become a labor doula.  I volunteered at a birthing center in San Diego, where I witnessed women and their partners give birth in the most unrestricted, beautiful way.

In graduate school, I worked as a labor and delivery nurse on a high-risk unit.  While some of the births resembled the idyllic births I witnessed in San Diego, many of the deliveries were traumatic and brutal.  I started to understand why some see birth as a medical procedure.   The final straw was the birth of my own baby in 2006.  I became very sick and had to have him delivered by c-section, seven weeks early.  I was over birth.  So I was a midwife, who happily took care of women, but I did not catch babies.

When we moved to the sheep dairy in early 2007, I was exposed to birth yet again.  Oliver and I would sit in the fields and watch the sheep labor and birth their lambs.  I had a healing birth experience with Pearl in 2009 and I was able to let go of so much sadness.  When the first kid was born on our farm last year, I felt the same wonder and joy as I felt about birth so many years ago in my small apartment.  The birth of our kids this year made me feel like a true midwife again.  So now I am a midwife, who happily takes care of women, and I catch goat babies.  For now, I am completely satisfied.

Please enjoy my spring birth and baby photos!

Pearl is providing labor support to Leche.  Pearl and I had a great morning hanging out, waiting for Leche to deliver.
                                          

Oliver arrived home right after Leche delivered her second baby.

Leche's newborn kids enjoyed their first day out in the sunshine.

      

Oliver was bonding in the birthing stall with Ace, Serio's baby.

RIP Leroy, Serio's baby, who we fought hard to save.  

This is Leche's handsome boy.

Pearl was pleased to see she is not the only toddler who enjoys a good nurse.

So many spring evenings are spent in the pasture kid-watching.

Oliver and his buddy Ace.

Pearl is one lucky toddler!

   

Earth Day!

If you didn't hear from me for a couple of weeks in April, it is because I became consumed with our Earth Day project.  We decided as a family we would take on our first event as the Giving Tree Family Farm.  We sat down a couple of weeks ago and mapped out our booth.  Each member of the family had a huge "to do" list.  The first order of business was a logo.  My dad got to work with his favorite graphic designer and came up with this great logo.  Deciding on a name and logo were the most difficult tasks!

My sister came up with the design of the booth.  She had visions of white lace, antique plates to display the soap, and old books and boxes for props.  My mom spent a week putting all of our alpaca yarn into skeins and we designed posters and informational cards.  It truly was shaping up to be a family affair!  We all arrived to El Chorro Regional Park early on Earth Day.  Here is a picture of our completed booth.  We all loved the way it turned out.

Our booth was divided into four sections.  My sister makes jewelry and made special bee pieces for Earth Day.

Glenn and I were the bee experts.  We sold beeswax bars, candles and lip balm.  Glenn got some people seriously excited about keeping bees.  I loved showing off the bear claw marks in our beeswax.  

My mom was the "goat lady."  She spent hours talking to people about raising goats and all of the benefits of goat milk.  

The last section was the alpaca yarn display.  People loved the pictures of Mic, Pablo and Remy next to their skeins of yarn.  

Earth day was a great trial run for our young business.  The kids enjoyed their day in the sun: dancing, planting herbs, and making paw prints out of plaster.  The adults spent the day talking about our hobbies, hanging out with fellow Earth-loving friends, and sipping wine.  It may not have been the most profitable day, but it was a good day. 

A special thank you to Mother Earth for making it all possible!

Farm Animals Gone Wild

I haven't written about Smokey lately because Oliver will not ride him anymore.  Oliver was riding Smokey a couple of months ago (with his helmet on) and Pumpkin started chasing Smokey and biting his legs.  Smokey bucked Oliver straight onto his forehead.  We though Oliver would eventually get over the trauma and get back on Smokey.  So far, it has not happened.  We had a horse professional come over to take care of Smokey's feet and he told us someone in the family should be riding Smokey.  Smokey can handle up to 230 pounds of weight.  This weekend we spent some time in the pasture trying to figure out who should ride Smokey.

Pearl was first.  She only lasted a couple of seconds before she threw in the towel.

Glenn was the next to ride Smokey.  Glenn can tell you it is really hard to ride a horse who is biting your feet while your wife is chanting, "Eight seconds! Eight seconds!"  

Sadly, he was no Luke Perry.

It was my turn to take on the tiny beast.  Things were going okay until Pumpkin started messing with Smokey.

My mom thought it may be easier to ride Smokey with a lead rope.  It was rocky from the start.  Smokey wanted me off in a bad way.  Finally he did a tricky maneuver and tossed me on my hip.  Evidently my near death-by-pony was funny to certain members of my family. 

Something was in the air that morning because all of the animals were feeling spry.  Lotta, Pumpkin, and Smokey had a great time chasing each other around the pasture.

Oliver and Pearl first checked Leche for signs of pregnancy, then retired to an oak tree to hide from the crazy animals.

Moments later, Leche decided to join the children in the tree.  It was ten seconds of sheer terror! 

After all of the ruckus, it was time to make amends and go back to peaceful pasture life.

The Good and Gross of Goat Ownership

When people hear about our farm many people say, "I would love to have goats and make cheese and soap!"  And, yes, that part of it is really fun.  I want to ask, "Are you willing to put your entire arm into a goat's vagina at midnight or chase it around to gather its feces?  If so, you are ready to be a goat owner!"  This post will review the "work" and "play" aspects of goat ownership.

Work

My mom makes natural goat worming balls for our goats.  Since we are not treating them with chemicals, it is important we check their feces for worm eggs.  She purchased a microscope and we spent an afternoon searching for eggs.  First we had to collect fresh specimens from each goat.

Pearl must have thought we were crazy!

We asked Glenn to do the boys because they are more difficult.  In the picture below, Glenn is thinking how much easier his life would have been if he had married a city girl.

Once we collected samples from each goat, we brought the poop into the kitchen.  We mashed it up with sticks and added a salty solution to it.  It was then strained and put into test tubes.  We waited for 15 minutes for the worm eggs to float to the top of the tubes.

While we waited, Oliver's mind was being blown by frog blood and cheek cells.  

Finally, the slides were ready to view.  We found a few worm eggs on each slide.  We were very happy to find less than ten eggs each.  Our goats have healthy guts!

Play

My mom and I took a soap making class when I was pregnant with Pearl.  She has been reading everything she can gets her hands on about goat-milk soap.  Finally, she was ready to make her first batch.  We assembled a team to help with our first attempt at soap.

First my mom added all of the liquid oils to a pot.  She then added lye to our frozen goat milk.  Pop's job was to entertain Pearl during the lye process.

All of the ingredients (oils and goat milk/lye mixture) and essential oil (grapefruit, in our case) were mixed together until they were the consistency of pudding.

My mom carefully poured the mixture into molds.

The final product smells wonderful and makes an excellent lather in the shower!  Look for goat-milk soap in our shop soon!