Warning! Foster Care Can Lead to Goats

These past 2 weeks have seen the addition of quite a few mammals to our little farm.  We grew by 2 puppies, another 30 chickens, 4 goats, 6 ducks, and a partridge in a pear tree.  Okay, not really the partridge, but you get my point.  I never intended to have 30 more chickens (We had 25 already) and 6 ducks.  That just sort of happened, but the puppies and goats were part of the plan.

This partly explains my absence from blogging (well, that and horrible internet problems).  I have been BUSY.  I also have green beans coming in already, so I am gearing up for picking and canning. I guess we are kind of becoming a homesteading family. At least when I search the internet for answers to my questions I oftentimes end up reading advice from homesteading types.  Over the past couple of years we have been working towards growing and providing as much for our family as we can on our own.  I am no expert, but it has become important to me.

I think the addition of the 3 little boys was definitely a part of the push for me.  I kept thinking about how much food costs have gone up and how they would probably keep going up. At some point I will have 4 boys ranging from 12 -18 years old and if I know anything about boys its that they can clean out a refrigerator in no time.  We get a foster care per diem right now and the boys are little, so it hasn't been too hard on us, but I am trying to think smart and plan to use our resources efficiently to provide well for my family now, and in the future.

 We save so much money by growing our own food, and by buying meat in bulk from the butcher.  Recently a family member came to visit.  Cyrus and Liv were asking why we weren't eating out as we munched on pork burgers, sweet corn, applesauce, and green beans.  We started by adding up the costs of the meal we were currently eating.  Because the produce came from our home and the meat came from the butcher, the meal, which fed 8 of us, cost approximately $4.50.  If we had gone to our favorite "cheap" sit down restaurant it would have been $45 and a tip.  The kids and the visiting family member were duly impressed.  It has been this kind of thinking that has led us down this road of attempting to be more self-sufficient. 

All of that was to explain to you why we now have goats.  Obee can't drink regular milk.  He has some kind of reaction to the lactose.  I have to buy him special milk that costs $4.45 for a half gallon!  That is nearly $10 a gallon!  We had talked about getting goats several times.  Goats would help keep down the annoying weeds in our pasture, they would be wonderful trimmers for the blackberry bushes, we like goats, and we could all drink goat's milk becoming that much more self-sufficient.

We were given Dixie, she is a Boer goat, which is a meat goat and not a dairy goat, but someone asked if we'd be willing to take her as their life no longer permitted a pet goat.  Dixie got the ball rolling.  She ate the weeds, but did not provide any milk, which was what my heart truly desired.  We started looking around and that brought us to our Nubian, Courtnay and her two kids, Stars and Stripes (names chosen by
Cy and Liv). 

Now Courtnay is a first time freshener (I think that's how you say it).  What that means is that these are her first kids and she has NEVER been milked.   I am a first time milker and what that means is Courtnay and I are muddling through as best we can.  I saw Courtnay's Mom get milked.  I practiced on her Mom, and I thought, "No problem!  I've totally got this!"  The one eensy-weensy problem is that Court does not appreciate anyone handling her udder and she has absolutely zero patience for a novice.  After about a week of milking practice we are finally getting measurable milk,  Court still tries to hop, kick, and bump all over the milkstand, but she is beginning to settle and I am starting to improve on this milking thing.  We turned the corner the day I stared her dead in the eye and said, "YOU ARE NOT WINNING THIS!  I took on 3 little boys at one time.  THREE!  If I can do that, then I am definitely more stubborn than you are (Yes, I actually said this out loud to a goat)."  Courtnay, who is currently raising 2 demanding kids must have had sympathy because she settled down after our little chat.

So just remember if you are thinking about going into foster care and maybe adopting this could lead to all kinds of new frontiers you never even dreamed of before.  You might wake up one morning and go out to milk a goat and in some strange way it will be one of the most satisfying things you have ever done.