Ducks, Round One: Lessons Learned

We wanted some egg layers, but I just don't like chickens all that much and I liked the idea of ducks so much better. Here are some of my reasons:

1) if we decide we want to be able to replace our ducks the natural way (rather than going back to the store every time we need more ducks/chicks) we have to have at least one male. A drake seems much less annoying than a rooster.

2) I had read that ducks don't wreak as much havoc on the plants in your yard as chickens do. I liked that idea. 

3) I just like ducks more. They are cute and soft and nice.

It was spring, and IFA, CAL ranch and Tractor Supply were all selling cheap ducklings, so we decided to pull the trigger.

LESSON 1! Where you buy your duck matters

Your local country store is not a great place to buy ducks. They did not know the sex or even the breed of the ducks they sold us. Then when I asked them what other supplies I needed to care for my ducks, they shrugged and said "food and bedding?" So, yes, they were not helpful AT ALL. So unless you don't care what breed you get or what sex you get...don't buy them from the country stores. You can easily buy ducklings from a local small farm with ducks and at least know what breed you are getting, even if you don't know the sex. The local duck owners will also be able to give you much more information and help about caring for the ducks. Another option is mailing in ducklings from a hatchery. Mail order hatcheries come with their own risks of problems, but they will be much more helpful with information about caring for you ducks than the local country store.

We ended up getting a heating lamp (a must for new ducklings!), some bedding, and one of these types of feeders. We bought them some food, but later found out that it was insufficient for new ducklings nutritional needs. If anyone tells you that you can just give them chicken food, or all flock food, or even adult duck food, do not listen.

LESSON 2! Be careful what feed you give them

Ducklings need very specific duckling food. it has to have enough protein and enough niacin or you will end up with either dead ducks or deformed ducks to the point that may lead you to have to do some mercy killings. Not a pleasant thing. 

MannaPro or Nutrena have good duckling options. You can also supplement niacin with brewers yeast, if you find it needed.

LESSON 3! Water is dangerous, use the right waterer

We did not buy the watering can that is similar to the feeder that we bought. I had read that ducks need to be able to submerge their whole beak into the water to clean up because they are such messy eaters (all very true), and I did not think that type of waterer would meet the ducks needs (not true). I gave them a bowl of water that they could easily submerge their beaks into. It also meant that they could get into it and they did so frequently. Ducks are messy and they are clumsy and they will make a mess of any food and/or water that they are able to. Their bedding would get soaked quickly and they gummed up their food getting it wet too, which them made the dispenser action not work properly. Within a few days the ducks had grown so much (ducks grow FAST!) and were using so much water that even when I refilled their water right before bed they ended up out of water before morning. I decided to give them a bigger water bowl. I thought that if I gave them one that was tall enough that they could not get into it, that would be a good thing. WRONG! If there is water, ducks WILL FIND A WAY to get into it! Unfortunately, after getting in, our duckling was not able to get back out and drowned, during the night. Take my advice, buy one of the conventional waterers. They actually work great for ducklings.

Once it was warm enough outside and the ducks had their adult feathers, we moved them outside with a small play house as their "pen" and a kiddie swimming pool to drink and bath in. They make a total mess of their water almost instantly and we would have to replace the water in the pool every day or two. They also poop--A LOT--and it's very watery and messy: not something you can easily clean up. We had them inside a chicken wire movable run and we would move it from spot to spot in our yard every 2-3 days and then use a thatcher on our grass to try to clean up the poopy duck mess from where they had just been. It was a lot of work, but we sure loved our ducks. 

After a few weeks of watching them, we decided that what we must have had were Pekin Ducks. Later on, they got so massive, I decided they must have been Jumbo Pekins. They were huge. Everywhere I read said that we would be able to tell if they were boys or girls because between ages 8-12 weeks the boys would develop a curly tail feather. This was not the case for us. Their tail feathers did not turn curly until 14-18 weeks old. And at that point we found that ALL our ducks were male! How is that even possible??? Since we don't have the space to keep a whole flock of fighting/territorial males, and the whole purpose was for them to give us eggs, we had to get rid of our beloved ducks. It was a very sad day and the kids are still scarred from the experience. Just more evidence that you should NOT get ducks from a local country store.

Overall it was a very good learning and growing experience, but I wish we had started out the right way from the get go. Hopefully you can learn from my mistakes! Metzer Farms has a great blog with really good info for taking care of ducks. 

Best of luck!    

Natural Products for Baby (and Mom!)

In the time between having my fourth baby and my fifth, I became much more "in to" natural products. Previously, I would regularly wipe down surfaces throughout my house with Clorox Wipes and/or spray everything down with a generous coating of Lysol. No matter what I did, my kids still got sick and still passed their sickness to everyone in the house. Then, one year, I switched to cleaning most of my kitchen and main living area with Vinegar, instead. I found that my kids still got sick (seriously, school is like a cesspool) but the amazing thing was that it would stop with that kid. It didn't get spread to everyone in the house, if I was good about cleaning all surfaces with vinegar, every day. I was quickly converted! And you can buy 2 gallons of vinegar at costco for only $3 or $4! Nice!

Then I started using more essential oils, both for cleaning and for treating minor illnesses. DoTerra, and Young Living are the "name brands", but there are others to check out! Like Edens Garden or Revive which both have quality essential oils for a much nicer price.

And before I knew it I was making my own face wash and deodorant! (I can't find the link to the recipe for my homemade deodorant, but here it is: heat up 4-6 TBSP coconut oil in microwave, stir in 3/4 cup arrowroot powder, 1/4 cup baking soda and essential oils as desired ( lemon, orange, lavender are all good choices). The next obvious step was reusable menstrual products (which, by the way, I actually find much more comfortable than the more expensive and wasteful disposable alternatives). I use cups for heavy days, reusable cloth pads for medium days, and period panties. (If you decide to go green for your period, look around! There are a surprising number of companies that provide the products you may be looking for, no need to pay the extra money for the name brand! I actually own both a Thinx pair and 2 Bambody pairs that I linked you to, and I find the off brand, cheaper Bambodies more comfortable and less diaper-y, check out reviews and see what other people have to say about everything. Also, supporting the underdog helps encourage innovation, improvements and more competitive prices by all!).

Then, I was introduced to Norwex, super-micro fiber cleaning clothes that are embedded with silver to trap and kill germs! These products are pretty incredible, you should check them out. I have clothes, hand towels, face clothes, etc. Seriously, if you are thinking about using less toxic cleaning options, I recommend 1) vinegar, 2) replace your dryer sheets with wool dryer balls, (I've been using mine for over a year and they are still going strong...and with 5 kids...I do a lot of laundry!) and 3) get a kitchen rag from Norwex.

ENTER BABY PREPARATIONS!

As I got ready for baby, I bought a greener laundry soap from Costco. I found a home made hand soap recipe, and there are many similar recipes for baby wash (don't forget the foaming soap dispensers!). All the castile soap I found already has essential oils added. I basically just squirt some castile soap in, and add water. I'm a minimalist, like that :)

I found some recipes for homemade diaper rash cream and "boobie balm" to use instead of Lanolin. Both recipes were pretty similar: involving beeswax, shea butter and some lavender essential oil. Sadly, I cannot recommend the homemade boobie balm. I really wish I could, but I can't. Here is my experience from using them: the boobie balm was AMAZING at healing my sore nipples as I started nursing again. The problem? It was also amazing at clogging my milk ducts, leading to repeated episodes of mastitis, which is basically the worst thing ever. (side note, did you know that Wintergreen oil is INCREDIBLE at healing mastitis? Rub the oil around your breasts and armpits --I usually avoid my actual nipples though--when you first start to feel it coming on, and be sure to clear those clogs! This treatment can have you better in a number of hours, instead of the days it takes to feel better on antibiotics!)
Anyway, I think the problem is that beeswax, and to a lesser extent shea butter, has a very high melting point, so it coats and clogs and is very hard to remove. I ended up having to go back to using regular lanolin, instead of my homemade stuff.

That being said, using them for dry skin would be great! I still use it, occasionally, as diaper cream, and I think it would do wonders on my kids dry cracked hands, this winter!

I also have been using these reusable nursing pads. Just be sure to change them regularly, especially in the beginning, as they get gunked up by all the lanolin and excess lactating. Just throw them in the wash and get a clean pair every day, or twice a day as needed.

Finally, on my line up of natural baby products: my sister gave me some Norwex baby clothes that have been AMAZING! All of my kids have gotten pretty bad baby acne at about 2 months. At one point someone gave me the tip that washing their face with head and shoulders helps, so I start putting a little dab on the corner of a wash cloth and carefully washing their poor little faces, avoiding the eyes. It DID help slightly, but they were still plagued by acne for a month or so. By contrast, with my fifth, all I did was wash her face with warm water and her baby norwex rag. I did this every day, or every time I noticed acne starting to crop up again. You guessed it. It was AMAZING! It helped keep a handle on that baby acne better than anything I have yet seen!  And I don't have to feel worried about anything getting in her eyes, or mouth, or feel bad for using harsh chemicals on my baby. Love it!

There you have it! There are my recommendations. Good luck!

Nut Free School Lunches

School started a week ago. 2 of my 3 daughters are in "nut free" classrooms and are not supposed to bring nuts of any kind to school. It can be challenging for me to think of lunches that my kids will actually eat that don't involve peanut butter, Nutella, or trail mix. So, perhaps for my own future reference as much as to help others out, here is a list of some of the ideas I have had and/or utilized this last week!
And just one quick side note: leftovers are my friends. Most of what my kids ate, last week, was leftovers!

Coffee Cake
Croissant (leftover from chicken salad sandwiches, but most of my kids won't eat the chicken salad, and just eat the croissants plain. But this does bring up the ideas of chicken salad sandwiches, egg salad sandwiches and even meat and/or cheese sandwiches, if your kids will eat them! Most of my kids will not.)
Chili with cheese
Scones (the fry bread kind...not the weird, thick cookies that people have started calling "scones")
Power bar/Granola bar
Microwave dumplings (Sold at my Costco)
Home made lunchables (ritz crackers with cut up slices of meat and cheese)
Pizza (leftover, or homemade lunchable version: when I make home made pizza, sometimes I pull some of the dough aside and make tiny pizza crusts that I bake with nothing on them. then send the kids with the crust, I tiny bit of leftover pizza sauce and a little bit of shredded mozzarella cheese. This is a big hit)
Bean and cheese burrito (my kids have been known to eat these at room temp, without even microwaving them)
Pancakes/waffles with a small container of syrup
Tupperware of cold cereal with money for milk
Muffins
Banana bread
Leftover pasta
Hard boiled eggs
Sushi (two of my kids actually love the California rolls sold at my Costco. I just sent them each with 5 or 6)
Bagels
Cinnamon Pull-Aparts (some people call it Monkey Bread)

Good luck, everyone! We've got a whole year to go! Do you have some favorite, easy nut-free school lunches? I could always use more ideas!

Books for 3rd and 4th Grade

Let me start by saying that I much prefer the old classics, when it comes to books, over the new "favorites." I love that the characters in the old books speak a) kindly, b) with clean language and c) with correct English. I love the morals in the old books. I love the expanded vocabulary in the old books.
That being the case, you can tell that this stance may sway my favorites to be different from some other people's favorites. But, be that as it may, here is a list of some of the books that my daughters in 3rd and 4th grade have enjoyed, this year. Some are from our school's Battle of the Books list, and some are not.

Mr Poppers Penguins--A short, easy read for 3rd and 4th graders, with a charming tale about a man who wished he could have been an adventurer. He is surprised to find himself raising a waddle of penguins.
Lincoln and Kennedy, A Pair To Compare--To be honest, my kids didn't actually love this one, but it's a great book to read together with your kids and learn more about history.
Because of Winn-Dixie--The title sounded super boring to me (and my kids) but we all ended up loving this one. It is a story of a girl and all the good things that come into her life, thanks to her ugly, rescued/adopted dog, Winn-Dixie. She learns that we all make mistakes, but that we are more than our mistakes and we can all use good friends.
My Father's Dragon--A fun, magical journey to rescue an enslaved dragon.
Phineas L. Macguire...Erupts! The First Experiment--Actually, my daughter didn't love this one, but I think boy readers might enjoy it more. It was a fun story about a boy who thinks of himself as a scientist. The science fair is coming up and he's not thrilled about which classmate he gets paired with, but he makes the most of it and finds new friends and helps others find new friends through the experience.
Charlottes Web--This is a fairly well known story of a pig who makes friends with a barnyard spider as they try to prevent the pig from being slaughtered.
Boxcar Children--This is a very fun story about 4 orphaned siblings who afraid of being placed in the care of their estranged grandfather. They find an abandoned boxcar to live from and make quite the fun and adventurous life for themselves, until...one of them gets sick. Then they find themselves needing to get help from adults. This one actually has a rather extensive series with fun mysteries in each book.
Goofballs (series)--I think there are only 6 books in this series, but they are very fun and entertaining for young readers. A group of very funny friends get together and solve mysteries together.
Mrs Piggle Wiggle- There are a few different books in this series. They are silly stories about an eccentric old woman who lives in an upside down house and whom all the neighborhood children love. Meanwhile, all the neighborhood mothers learn to call Mrs Piggle Wiggle for advice, whenever their children start developing various vices. Mrs Piggle Wiggle always has entertaining "cures" for whatever negative behavior kids start to have!
Pippi Longstocking--There are a few different books in this series, too. I don't know that I love this one, as Pippi might not have the most admirable character traits, but it is full of entertaining stories that my kids love. 
Babysitters Little Sister (series)--There is a whole host of books in this series and my 4th grader loves them. It follows the goings on of a younger sister of one of the babysitters from the Babysitters Club series that my older sister loved when she was a tween.
Bobbsey Twins (series)--two sets of twins in one family, and if that's not interesting enough, they love to solve mysteries for people! It's Nancy Drew for younger readers! How can you go wrong?
Grimmtastic Girls (series)--I haven't read these ones, but my 4th graders LOVES them. Each one is a less-grim-version of the Grimm fairytales (Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, etc).

Happy Reading! What are some of your favorite books for 3rd and 4th graders?

Switching to Sourdough...WITH KIDS!

My first attempts at actual sourdough bread. I started with:
Easiest Sourdough Bread by Weed 'em and Reap
Next I tried:
Natural Bread Yeast for Beginners by The Bread Geek
These were both good and I actually couldn't decide which I liked better. Most of my kids would eat the sourdough bread, but were not fans.
Then I tried
UN-sour Bread  by Weed 'em and Reap
This one is fantastic and all the kids eat it really well!
I even used that same UN-sour recipe to make whole wheat sour dough DONUTS! They turned out great!
This Natural Yeast Pizza Dough worked out great, too.
 In addition to these things I've been using up extra sourdough start on a lot of pancakes and waffles. I've learned to throw some milk, eggs a little bit of baking soda and salt and it works out great! I don't have an actual recipe for those...I just throw things in.
I've also had several Natural Yeast/Sourdough fails...but I'm excited about these good recipes I've found and that I am finally having success with this! Yay! I still use sprouted wheat flour in most of my recipes normal recipes (pancakes, waffles, cookies, pumpkin bread, applesauce muffins, banana bread, cream of wheat...), but it's nice to add sourdough to my repertoire so that I can make some of the other things (bread and pizza dough) that don't work with sprouted flour.

Switching to a Traditional Diet...WITH KIDS!

Hi there!
So, my family has stomach problems. They get it from their father. :)
Seriously, though, diarrhea is just a part of our life. Stomach pain? We're not even sure what life would be like without it! My number 2 daughter has been complaining about her stomach hurting regularly for...a long time. She keeps asking me to take her to the doctor and I keep saying 'no.' That might sound horrible, but I've been to the doctor for kids' stomach pains multiple times before, and it is just not helpful. They charge me hundreds of dollars to tell me that I will have to use the trial and error method to find out what's causing their pain myself, and then avoid it. 'Wow. Thanks. I never would have thought of that myself.'
For some time I have been learning about the so called Traditional Diet, and I have wanted to try it, but it just...sounded really intimidating. Let's be honest, changing our diet is changing our lifestyle, you know? Besides, I had tried to keep sourdough/natural yeast and it just...well...I haven't mastered it. So that leaves me with only soaking or sprouting my grains, and I didn't think we could make actual loaves of bread, that way. And without any bread...what would we eat on a daily basis?
But I have been actively researching on Pintrest ;) and once I had found enough soaking and sprouting recipes, I decided to dive right in. I spent the first week only making soaked recipes, and in the mean time, I worked on sprouting some wheat to use for the second week of the trial.
Those of you who have kids know that you can't change anything about their diet without them freaking out and thinking you're trying to poison them. This was no different. In the hopes that I can save you some trouble, here is a list of some of recipes I tried, and how my kids took to each of them.

Soaking Method:

Cream of Wheat --My husband and kids have stomach allergies with oats, so this is the only hot cereal we do. My older two girls love cream of wheat, but my younger two kids won't touch it, so I didn't even try to make them. I LOVED how simple this recipe was and I thought it was perfectly tasty! My kids, on the other hand...were weeping and wailing like it was the end of the world! It took number 2 a full HOUR to eat it! (She's the one who I finally decided to do this diet for, after all, and if I let her not eat her food, she would go to school hungry and probably get an "emergency snack" from her teacher which would probably have unsoaked grains, so then we would never be able to tell if the diet was working...so...I just made her finish it).
Waffles --These had a bit of a sourdough taste to them, but without having to master sourdough (score!). My kids were not fans, but number two finished a whole one with minimal complaining. The other three struggled to finish half of one each.
Tortillas --I didn't actually make my other three even try these, since I felt like it was a lot of work for only a few tortillas, and...well, I'm kinda lazy. But number two loved them! Yay!
Pizza Dough --The whole family ate this homemade pizza without ANY complaining! Hooray!
Rice --Uhh, my kids are used to white rice, so...the whole brown rice thing didn't go over very well with a couple of them, although number 2 and number 4 at this just fine! So...50%! Ha!
And finally, the recipe that gave me courage to officially start this diet in the first place: BREAD!--This was not my kids' favorite bread (translation: it can't compare with white bread), but the entire family will eat it without complaining! HALLELUJAH!

Sprouted Method:
Sprouting wheat is not hard, but, in some ways it's kind of annoying. It's annoying that I constantly have multiple jars of moist wheat berries laying sideways by kitchen sink. It's annoying that I have to pull out the dehydrator every couple of days to dry the sprouted wheat out. And then I still have to grind them before I can use them. BUT, although it's annoying to actually  sprout the wheat, it's so easy to make food with, once it's sprouted, dried and ground up.
I made Cream of Wheat, pancakes (with sprouted flour, they tend to be a little flatter, especially when overcooked even a little bit, so watch and make sure to flip and remove before over cooking at all), waffles (with the sprouted flour, the top and bottom of the waffles tend to rip apart when opening the lid, so be careful when opening and removing), and pumpkin bread with all my normal recipes. All I had to do was substitute sprouted wheat flour with the normal wheat flour. And all my kids happily ate all of those things without a word!
I also made this Banana Bread with sprouted flour, which my kids also devoured.
And these Tortillas --which we ALL decided we liked better than the soaked tortillas (plus, I had an easier time rolling these out).
I tried this Pizza Dough --which was a total bust. None of us liked it.

So, I guess the take away is that, other than bread and pizza dough, we prefer sprouted over soaked. But the soaked bread and pizza dough are both great! And I have been able to use sprouted flour in most of my normal recipes, so I can still make a variety of foods without too much trouble.

Check back later for my adventures with sourdough!

Our Fave Books for New Readers

Books for Pre K and Beginning Kindergarten to read TO YOU:
The books I start the kids out with when they are first learning to read simple words are
1) The Bob Books (bought from costco)
2) Family Readers series (picked up from the library)

Both of these books series are good for brand new readers because all of the words are words that follow the rules and can be sounded out. They also have a certain sound theme that goes throughout the book, so that the repetition really teaches them the corresponding rule. But, the kids hate reading these books because the story line is as simple as the words are. Once I have gotten them to read as many of the Bob books and family readers as they will tolerate, we move on to some books with more fun stories:

1) Biscuit books We LOVE these books! They are really cute, and easy to read. And no one is mean (an important criteria for acceptable media at our house).
2) Usborne Phonics Readers Another FAVORITE series! These are really fun and cute stories and -again- they have a certain sound repeated throughout the story, so the kids really get down the sound the -OW makes when they read "Cow takes a bow," etc.

Books I read to my Kindergarteners/ beginning elementary kids:

1) Boxcar children--This is probably my all time favorite book to read to my kids. It is a fun story and everyone is NICE!
2) Minnie and Moo series--These books are really fun, with some really clever writing. Simple stories that the kids enjoy hearing
3) Magic Treehouse Series--The kids travel to different times and places via books and a magic treehouse. My 1st grader loves them, but my Kindergartner finds them a little too intense, sometimes.
4) My Father's Dragon--A boy travels to a magical land to free an enslaved dragon. It's a very fun story.