From a Crying Baby to a Cattle Farm

It’s funny how life sometimes takes you in a direction you never expected. For us, the road to farming started with a crying baby.

When our oldest daughter was born in spring of 2014, we thought she had colic. She cried. A lot. And not just the occasional fussy baby kind of crying. We spent months going to the pediatrician, and trying different things to figure out what was wrong and how to help her.

Jason and I settled into a routine of trading six-hour shifts. One would hold her and try to console her while the other got some work done or rested. It was exhausting, and honestly, it was hard watching our little girl be so uncomfortable without knowing how to help her. 

Looking back, it was a blessing that I was unexpectedly let go from my job a couple weeks before Q was born, and that Jason was self-employed at the time. It gave us flexibility during a stressful time.

After months of this, we finally found some relief through a nutritionist and chiropractor. I was pumping at the time, and after making suggested changes to my own diet and giving her digestive enzymes, we began to see a radical difference in our daughter in just one week’s time.

It was like having a completely different baby. The crying settled down, she was more comfortable, giggles and smiles emerged, and we finally started to feel like we could breathe again.

As we learned more about her food and chemical sensitivities, we started paying much closer attention to the food in our home. We needed organic, clean sources of food, including beef, in order to help keep her discomfort at bay.

Sounds simple enough, right? But, finding beef that met the standards we were looking for wasn’t always easy. We could find farmers raising 100% grass-fed beef, but they didn’t necessarily have it available when we needed it.

And that’s where the idea of raising our own cattle began.

From Two Beef to Maybe Forty (?)

At the time, Jason’s dad was getting closer to retirement. If you know Papa, though, you know sitting still isn’t really his thing.

So, Jason had an idea. What if we raised a couple of beef on his parents’ land? We could have the kind of beef we needed to feed our families, with a little extra to share.

He approached his dad with the idea and asked if the horse fencing was still up. As it turned out, Papa had just taken it down! But he was open to the idea of raising cattle.

Papa started figuring out how many head of cattle the land could actually support. While Jason and I were thinking two, he had a much bigger number in mind.

Thirty to forty head.

I guess we weren’t quite thinking big enough!

Jason dove into researching cattle breeds, different ways to approach rotational grazing, holistic animal care, fencing requirements, market pricing, and more. He shared what he learned with Papa and they started planning and building.

By the fall of 2015, we were ready for cattle and brought our first two Belted Galloways home. (Funny story, one of them got out of the fencing the first day and roamed the area for a few months, her name was Wanda!)

What started as a simple idea to provide better food for our family had just turned into reality.

Growing Along the Way

Over the years, we’ve gradually built up the herd, diversifying breeds, and learned a whole lot along the way. What began as a way to source food for our own family grew into a farming operation that became part of our everyday lives.

There have been plenty of changes since those first cattle came home. 

We initially lived ten minutes from the farm, so Jason left earlier in the mornings to get the daily rotation in. Weekends were often spent there as we put up more fencing, built a larger lean-to, put in the stockyard, added heated waterers, and more. It was truly our home away from home.

A few things changed for us in 2019. Jason had acquired a side business the year before, and while we gave it a go, it was hard to balance full-time work, a growing side gig, and the farm.

Jason stepped back a bit, Papa stepped in to do the rotational moves, and I started to help with the bigger moves, vet visits, sorting, weaning, and fall harvesting on top of the admin/customer side of things. 

We were also able to move to the farmhouse next to where we farmed, which has made it much more convenient to do pretty much everything.

Through the years we’ve learned through struggles and experiences. We have quite a few funny farm tales I hope to pass down to grandchildren some day. We’ve adjusted as needed, and watched the farm grow and change right alongside our family.

This past summer brought another big transition. We began shifting the day-to-day responsibilities so Papa could actually “retire.” Jason and I have now taken over managing the daily cattle operations and the kiddos are doing the daily chicken chores.

It’s a new season for us, and one that brings its own learning curve, but we’re grateful for the foundation that was built long before we took the reins.

When I look back, it’s hard to believe that so much of our life today can be traced back to those long nights with a very unhappy baby. We certainly didn’t set out with a plan to become cattle farmers. My city girl background still loves to laugh over this development. 

Really, we were simply trying to find a better way to feed our family.

Sometimes the things that change the direction of our lives start in the most unexpected places. 🤎