Thanks for taking the time to keep up with
Goat Milk Stuff! Here's what is new this March…
Flavored Chevre
Our fresh
goat cheese (chevre) is now available not just
plain, but in several different flavors including
Caramel,
Herbs de Provence,
Pumpkin, and
Sun-dried Tomato. We're working on some other blends as well, so if there is one that you'd love to see, please let us know.
Feta
Goat milk feta cheese is also now available. It is a salty goat cheese and available in
wedges or
crumbles. The feta wedges at the farm store come packaged in brine. When we ship the feta wedges, we do not ship it in brine because of the possibility of leakage. The brine will help the feta last longer (up to a year), but it is just as tasty without the brine, so don't worry if you are having it shipped.
You can use the feta wedges to make your own feta crumbles, by running them under cold water for about 10 seconds and then using a fork or your fingers to crumble.
Farm Tours
Tours of the farm continue to be very popular. So popular, that we have increased the number of tours we offer. Tours are now available Monday - Saturday at 10 am and 1pm. Scheduled tours cost $12 per person (and you get a free bar of soap).
If you are unable to make the tour at one of those times, we are doing our best to accommodate unscheduled tours. Unscheduled tours cost $20 per person (and you still get a free bar of soap).
Baby Goat Experience
For most people, their favorite part of the
farm tour is seeing the goats. If you'd like to spend more time with the goats than is allotted for the farm tour, you can now spend an hour in the baby goat pen. We have more information and you can schedule your event at the
Baby Goat Experience link.
Free Shipping
Just a reminder in case you missed the previous announcements - free shipping is available on all orders over $50 throughout the year. You don't have to do anything or add anything to your cart; it will all occur automatically. I would like to encourage you that if the $50 minimum is outside of your budget, try to find a friend or family member to add to your order so you can all save on shipping!
March Giveaway
We are bringing back giveaways for 2016! This month we're giving away a $25 gift certificate to be used on our website or in our farm store. You can find the entry widget on the
Goat Milk Stuff blog.
Since you're already signed up for the newsletter, all you have to do to get your first entry is put the email address that you used to subscribe to this newsletter in the widget. It's that easy! For extra entries, you can follow us on various social media sites or answer a question. Just make sure you go through the widget, so your entries are counted. Good luck!
Congratulations to Cindy Barr who won the February contest and a $25 gift certificate.
Happy Easter!
We want to wish everyone a wonderful Easter as we celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus. Easter is very early this year (March 27th) and we admit to being caught by surprise. We made a limited number of our popular
Daffodil soap for Easter, but it isn't fully cured until March 21st.
If you wish to order it now, we are making it available, but you will need to finish curing it at your home. Please take it out of the cotton bag and put it somewhere it can get airflow and be out of direct sunlight. It is safe to use now, but if you use it before it is fully cured, it will not last very long.
Orders placed by midnight on Tuesday 3/22, will ship out by Wednesday 3/23. If the USPS does its part, your order will arrive by Saturday 3/26 in time for Easter.
Newsletter Special
This month's newsletter special is for our new cheeses. For a limited time only, you can receive a
4 pack of cheese or an
8 pack of cheese (your choice of flavors and types) at an almost 40% discount. We would really love for you to try them and hope that this discount helps you to find your favorite type of goat cheese!
Homestead Happenings
February is all things baby goat here at the farm. Our family doesn't go anywhere and we don't schedule anything during this month. We just spend time delivering, feeding, loving, and caring for baby goats.
Fortunately, the baby barn was (mostly) finished.
We've had over 100 babies born this year, and we're not sure how we would have managed without the additional space for the babies.
As you can see, there is lots of space fo the babies to spread out...
or not...
depending on what they want to do.
When we feed the babies, they start out on individual bottles.
But once they reach about 3 days old, Greyden trains them to the lambar feeder, which is basically a bucket with nipples connected to straws so they can suck out the milk. We wait til they're a few days old so they can suck up the milk through the straws.
Some baby goats are born big, and some are born small...
But they're all beautiful in their own way.
Brett usually writes blog posts about all of the birthing experiences. They all came so fast this year, she hasn't had much of a chance to do it. But hopefully she'll get to it at some point before we forget the details.
We had 67 pregnant does this year. As of the writing of this newsletter, there are only 7 does left to have their kids. Here is the count for the year so far.
60 does delivered, 7 left to go
1 set of quads, 10 sets of triplets, 29 twins, 17 singles, 3 aborted early
43 live doelings, 59 live bucklings, 102 babies total
44 babies on the farm, 11 waiting to go to their new homes
Overall it has been a wonderful kidding season. Exhausting and full of ups and downs. It started out a little rough, but is winding down (we're almost finished!) very easily, for which we are very grateful. I always said that God gives us the tough ones at the beginning when he knows we still have the energy to handle it.
I'll leave you with a few videos of the baby goats for you to enjoy!
We thank you so much for all of your support of our family and our business!
The Jonas Family
Jim, PJ, Brett, Colter, Emery, Fletcher, Greyden, Hewitt, Indigo, and Jade
