Moo

Last week our family was able to fulfill a longtime dream of ours of purchasing livestock. Granted, Cara didn't come to us in the traditional way, but she is ours nonetheless. Well, at least 1/14th of her.

Meet Cara

Cara, blog readers. Blog readers, Cara.

She's a little camera shy. But isn't she beautiful?

We purchased what is known in the state of Indiana as a "cow share". You can also purchase a herd share, but at this particular farm there are only five such "Dairy Queens" so for now, a cow share it is. In purchasing a cow share we became legal owners of Cara, and we pay for her upkeep and boarding.

All five ladies, doing what the ladies were made to do. Cara is in the middle.

Cara comes to us from This Old Farm, located in the rolling countryside of Darlington, IN. Cara lives on a beautiful, expansive farm of 22 acres and is quite spoiled by farm owners, Erick and Jessica Smith. She thrives on acre after acre of beautiful, nutritious, fresh green grass. As you can see in the above pictures, she quite enjoys her feast. She is living the pampered life, as a cow's life goes. She has lots of freedom and plenty of room to move and live and breathe...and gestate. That's right, Cara is also going to be a mama come fall.

Entrance to "This Old Farm". I love how the robin so nicely posed for us.

Cara is a dairy cow and as her owners we are blessed to share in the bounty of her silky smooth, fresh, raw milk. We also enjoy skimming the cream off the top and making homemade butter and buttermilk. The taste is incredible, the health benefits are plentiful and it sure doesn't hurt that we know where our food comes
from and that we are supporting an incredible, local, sustainable farm and more importantly, farm family.

Yummy goodness.

A proud, raw milk family

Each Sunday, we travel to the farm, which is about 35 minutes one-way, to visit Cara and pick up our milk. Cara is milked Sunday morning for us and we like to go directly after church. This means there are approximately 2 hours, give or take a few minutes, between the time of her milking and the time we pick-up our milk. It doesn't get much fresher than that! In fact, this past week, we got there so close to her milking time that the milk was not even completely cold by the time we got it. We take it home immediately, put it in the coldest part of our refrigerator and it is ready for us to enjoy in just a few hours.

Enjoying a fresh cold one.

We are so thankful for the way God has provided this resource for our family. We are taking baby steps toward a more natural and healthful lifestyle and teaching life's valuable lessons along the way. This isn't necessarily how we saw the dream of livestock ownership taking shape, and as much as we would love to have Cara for our very own, we recognize and accept God's provision and blessing no matter the form it takes.

So long, Cara. See you next Sunday!

In future weeks I plan on sharing how we came into cow ownership and why we feel it is important to drink raw milk. In the meantime, share in the comments how God is blessing YOUR family these days? And I'm curious, have YOU ever had raw milk?

I'm linking up over at Raising Arrows' Simple Homemaking Link Up.

What does it mean to be healthy?

Ethan enjoys his green smoothie-yum!

Our family has been on a quest of sorts for about 3 years to become more healthy and physically fit. It all started when I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes with my third child.

At that time I was sent to a registered dietitian for a meal plan that was intended to help manage the diabetes without pharmaceutical intervention. The result of the appointment was me counting carbs and limiting all carbohydrates during my pregnancy. It didn't work, despite me following it religiously, and I became dependent upon self-injected insulin to manage my blood glucose levels.

Thankfully, everything worked out fine and Brady was born perfectly healthy with no ill effects whatsoever.

One positive result of this process was that I began doing a lot of research. A LOT a lot! I began to learn more and more about what it meant to be truly healthy.

News flash: the key is not a low-fat, low-carb, super restrictive diet. Sure you could lose weight that way, but would you really be HEALTHY? And who would want to?

My weight and dieting have been something with which I have always struggled. Shocking, I know. Even when I was skinny (yes, it's true-I should post some pictures sometime so you'll believe me) it was a constant struggle and a constant source of hardship and pain for me (think starving myself for a week at a time to get to where I thought I should be-yeah, not good). I used to think I had to count calories, eat a bunch of stuff I didn't like, deprive myself of foods I loved, and eat low-fat, low-calorie, low-flavor food.

However, over these past few years as I have learned more and more, my thinking on what it means to be healthy has changed. My basic, simple philosophy on food and diet now is this: the closer a food is to the way God created it, the better it is for you. That's it, in a nutshell. I figure God knew pretty well what He was doing-why mess with it?

So, how has that changed the way we eat? Well, no more fast food for one. The thought of a McDonald's hamburger totally disgusts me now. That one seems pretty obvious though-we all know fast food is bad for us right? RIGHT?

I also have cut out most forms of processed foods (I will buy the occasional box of healthy cereal for convenience sake). If I don't know what an ingredient is or I can't pronounce it, most likely it will not go in our shopping cart.

There is nothing low-fat about our diet, because most foods that carry that label are full of preservatives and man-made fillers and sweeteners that are way worse for you than natural fats. I REFUSE to count calories and fat grams. We simply eat good, wholesome, almost always made from scratch foods, and lots and lots of raw foods.

One way I have started helping my family increase their intake of fresh fruits and veggies (preferably organic, in-season, local produce) is by making smoothies. Smoothies are so awesome because you can put just about anything in them and they taste great.

Some of my favorite smoothie ingredients are bananas, mango, strawberries, blueberries (any kind of berry, really), clementines, grapes, apples, spinach, kale, avocado, carrots, tomatoes etc... Pretty much any combination that sounds good to you will work, but you want to get to the point where your veggie content makes up the majority of your smoothie.

You can make some pretty colorful, flavorful, interesting combinations. If your kids are particular about color, you probably want to go heavier on the berries as they tend to do a good job of masking the green/brown color of the veggies you want to add. I also add homemade yogurt and kefir (a natural probiotic).

I think he likes it!

Here is a link to The Green Smoothie Girl, who first got us started on this idea-well after a sweet friend referred me there. There are a lot of awesome resources on her site if you are interested in pursuing a more whole foods kind of diet.

I hope to blog about our food choices a lot more in the future. We are venturing into the world of gardening for the first time this summer-wish us luck!!! Hopefully, I can remember to blog about that adventure!

What about you? What do you think it means to be healthy? Have you been successful at making dietary changes in your family?