I dusted off the ole' Cool Breeze Farm blog with new inspiration to keep things active here in 2018. For a tiny update on our lives, we have added a new farmhand named William to the crew. He's almost 2.5 and although we have to deal with a broken egg from time to time he loves being a part of the farm and helping out with his big sister who is almost five. We are still raising pastured pork, beef, & laying hens as well as our seasonal gardens. Almost 5 years into this gig and we have learned so much through failures, had a few successes, and rode the wave of farming highs and lows. It's humbling work, not seeing the return immediately but to get satisfaction by the small wins day to day. We love being together as a family and perhaps, that is the most rewarding part of this lifestyle after all.

The New Year is upon us and we are so excited to share with you new recipes, products, events, and a daily glimpse into our farming lives. Be sure you are following us on Instagram at @CoolBreezeFarm and on Facebook as well. You'll also be hearing more about our sister company Deep Roots & Co. and by the way we will have our first event of the New Year on January 27 with Deep Roots! Read more about it here on the facebook event page!

The best way to stay up to date with us is to sign up for our newsletter. Click here to make it happen!
​
It's a fresh start. If you have wanted to change your families diet & choose healthier meats and eggs now is the time and we are here & happy to help. Happy New Year!

If you are looking for something to help you through this cold and flu season check out Lisa's Elderberry Elixir! Our family swears by it to keep healthy during the winter and our farm members received a free sample this year (thanks Lisa!!). Cool Breeze Farm was even able to have some of our elderberries used in some of her batches this year. We hope to cultivate more trees this spring for next year's harvest. Below you will find a message from Lisa describing her process, dosage, & benefits of the elixir as well as pricing.  Local orders only.  

My Elderberry Elixir is made with organic ingredients. I use dried US elderberries, cinnamon, cloves, ginger root, spices, Celtic sea salt, and filtered spring water. I simmer it with healthful intentions in a dedicated Gluten free, dairy free, nut free, soy free stainless steel pot. It is stored in boiled/sterilized glass jars with sterilized BPA free lids and rings. Some sediment or bits of berry is normal.

Elderberries have the multiple healthful properties making them a great addition to boosting immunity with the added bonus of tasting great on ice cream, pie, pancakes, or as a toddy with a dash of brandy! These amazing berries contain high amounts of vitamin A, vitamin C, the antioxidant quercitin, anti-inflammatory, and antiviral properties.

In our home we dose 1 teaspoon for children and 1 tablespoon per adult when illness strikes, or when we’ve been exposed to someone who shows symptoms soon after. Some people I know dose every day for the whole winter. Some dose 2 weeks on 1 week off. There is a wealth of information online about elderberries and the “syrup” that I call “elixir” since it is much thinner than many expect a syrup to be. You decide what works best for your family.

Love, light, and healthful intentions,
Lisa Newhall
[email protected]
540-414-3824


Pricing

 $5 for 4oz.
 $16 for 16oz.
 Special discount on 32 oz. jars if you mention Cool Breeze Farm in your order! Original price $32, discount price, $28.

We are up to 52 laying hens and 2 roosters. Keeping them alive from all of the predators in our woods sometimes feels like you are part detective and part revenge hunter.  Two weeks ago our egg numbers started to drop dramatically.  Was it the light?  Was it the cold?  Were they getting enough food?  There were no feathers strewn about as you will often find the night after a grisly attack and kill.  It is always such a sad feeling to see that trail of feathers into the woods.  We are almost surrounded by woods and full of critters that enjoy hunting after our chickens.  We've tossed around the idea of getting another farm dog (no offense Lilley, but you are 13 and can't hear) but until then we just have to keep a watchful eye and look for signs.  This leads me back to our current situation.  We fed them more laying mesh, corn, & made sure they had extra piles of fresh compost to scratch around in.  No eggs came.  We kept the light on longer thinking they needed more light & heat.  Nope.  Nothin'.  But see, we are learning something here in farming--patience.  The hardest lesson to learn, in my book.  But if you practice patience one of two things happens--you either find a pile of feathers or you catch the culprit in the act!  Enter stage left, Possum.  Andrew suspected a foul play possum at the center of this egg hold up but it wasn't until one night after turning the chicken house light out and locking the door that he heard commotion in the coop.   Swinging the door open, he found the Possum attacking one of our fearless rosters, ready to give his life to protect his flock.  Skittering off to the corner of the coop Andrew discovered a series of holes burrowed beneath the ground attached to the feed room.  We filled in the holes and took some other extra precautions for the coop and since then our layers are back in business.  Poor things were getting scared to death and were too afraid to lay.  We are grateful to have roosters this year and we think that is why we had not lost any chickens yet as he probably was going after eating the few eggs that were left.  Our roster is limping, but he seems like a tough guy who is gonna pull through.  

It's amazing how protective we can feel over these animals that we take care of.  I think trying to save chickens has take a few years off of our lives but here's to hoping that we have a break from critters and our girls get back to doing their job for awhile!  

So we figured, it's the winter and things are pretty slow on the farm right now, so let's get a blog going so we can keep you all up to date on what is going on in our world!  We might bore you a bit with pictures of cold chickens, snow (hopefully not too much), and empty garden beds right now but I'm sure we will have a funny story to share to hold us all over 'till spring!  

So what does a farming family do during the winter?  Chores, chores, and more chores.  All in the cold.  We also dreamily look at seed catalogues and start planning all of our big dreams for next season.  We are happy to be taking care of our first round of members this season so that is keeping us a little more busy than usual!  They recently stocked their freezers with pork and have been getting a weekly order of fresh eggs (that is until a possum disrupted things a big--but that's another story for another blog post).  On our super secret members only facebook page (don't you want to be a part of it too?!!!) we have been swapping recipes with our pork products and I will have to share with you all some of these delicious recipes soon.  

We hope that this is a space where we can let you all into our world a little more and share our lifestyle and farming adventures.  Please stop on back by!  

-Valerie