Vaughnshire Farm

Today we picked up our Freezer Pig.  After an entertaining summer with our farm pig the day finally came for him to graduate.  That’s right after a lot of study in the field (literally) and further reading and reflecting on what the Vaughn family has in the way of leftovers each day it was finally time for him to move from being a farm pig to a freezer pig.  This is a great milestone in every pig’s life and one you would think he would look forward to.

So on Tuesday we backed the truck up to his pen and
opened up the gate so he could jump right in the trailer.

Here pig pig pig….It’s uhm… graduation day

NO!… I don’t want to go to the butcher…
Some pigs are a faster study than others
so I tried to assist him in his decision making process.

Would you just get in the trailer?

Look I didn’t want it to come to this,
but I’m going to turn off the cameras.

OK so the real question is how DO you get a 300 pound hog in the trailer if he doesn’t want to go?  You don’t chase him in.  You don’t coax him.  You don’t reason with him.  You don’t ask “nicely”.  We tried all those things.  No the way we got our pig on the trailer was to lasso the hind legs, plug our ears and drag him in…. little by little, inch by inch, with him squalling and hollering the whole way!  But in the end - when it’s time to graduate - it’s time to graduate.

Finally at the butcher…a.k.a. the graduation ceremony

How would you like your freezer pig?…  “I’m going to go with frozen.”

Seriously, we found a great local processor who made the first hog processing a joy for the family.  We went down the check list and answered all the questions they had about the cuts we wanted and asked all the questions we had.  Questions like, “Do we get bacon”?  Or, “Can you render the fat”?  The answer to these questions was we can give you the slabs of bacon and we can put your fat in a bag for you.  We thought that was a great deal and left farm pig in the gentle hands of “Mrs. Tweedy”

So what do you think he weighed?  We had our family guessing game when we got home.  Here were our guesses:

248 - Daddy
316 – Pierce
250 – Mariah
250 - Peyton
230 – Mommy
230 – Patrick

I’ll give you the answer after the next picture in case you want to play your own family guessing game.  Just remember you are guessing the hanging weight, not his body weight which you see in the pictures and video above.

The next day we called for the weight and made sure farm pig made it through the ceremony ok.  They told us he did great and would be ready to come home on Friday.  Everyone was excited this morning when I announced it was time to go get freezer pig.  We grabbed the cooler, loaded up the truck, and headed out for the processor.  The picture below is the final result of this agrarian experiment. 

Not a bad summer’s work for carrying scraps from the kitchen to the field.  The answer to the weight question is 237 pounds of prime pork for .62 cents a pound.  Tell me again why we wouldn’t get another pig next year?  Of course we still have the exciting adventure of rendering lard and finding a meat slicer to slice our bacon…. I’m sure there will be fun stories coming up about those adventures.  Oh yea.  On Monday we pick up our beef for the year, since Monsanto won’t be ready to graduate until next summer.

We had a very eventful day full of remembering and giving thanks for the Providential hand of God in our lives.  Daddy read the historical account of how the Gospel was spread westward and laid out God’s Providential guiding hand in the lives of the Separatists who fled their homeland for Holland and then 12 years later fled Holland for America.  It is a mighty story of God’s faithfulness even amidst trials and tribulations.   It is a story that we tell our children so that they will remember where they came from and hopefully to instill in them the commitment and courage to take similar stands our forefathers took for the sake of the Gospel.  In the middle of our history lesson, we were interrupted by a herd of deer grazing in our yard.  One of the children saw the deer out of the living room window and we all jumped up and enjoyed watching them. 

We, of course, feasted on the bounty that the Lord has provided and gave many thanks in speech, action and by index card.  Index Card?  We started a tradition several years ago where we leave a container on the table where we can put handwritten “I am thankful for….” index cards in the jar to be read Thanksgiving night as we gather around the table again for supper.  Daddy reads the cards and we all enjoy hearing what everyone has written down.  The younger children who are unable to write yet, draw pictures of things they are thankful for or they can enlist an older buddy helper to write what they say.  It is a wonderful time of reflection, remembrance and thanks! 

One thanks we all gave was for the beautiful turkey our family was blessed to raise here on the farm this year.  The turkey meant all the more to us knowing that the work and care paid off in,  not only a wonderful learning experience for us, especially the boys, but also the provision of meat for our family. 

We had one small problem at about midnight last night.  That 40 lb turkey doesn’t fit in a 22 quart roasting pan.  However, that was the only pan we had that came even close to housing that massive turkey.

After a little bit of prodding and shoving….We fit the turkey in the pan.  It was a snug fit, but it would have to do. 

 Thankfully, it did fit in the oven and about 8 hours later it was ready.  We overestimated the cooking time and even though it was a little more done than ideal, the meat was absolutely wonderful!  We will be definitely raising our Thanksgiving turkey in the years to come (and hopefully additional turkey to sell)!

We also took a  ”Turkey Trivia” quiz during the day that my husband found online and set up for us all to take.  The winner of the trivia quiz was our 10 year old…  He beat out mom and dad even!  The winner of the quiz was privileged with being able to pull the turkey wishbone with the one who raised the turkey.  Here, the boys pose for a picture with the massive wishbone. 

Tomorrow we will be picking up our farm raised pork (folks around here call it a hawg) from the butcher and will have some interesting stories to tell about that experience.  As you might imagine, pigs don’t just jump in the trailer and asked to be taken to the butcher.  More to come…

Looking forward to a day of Thanksgiving tomorrow, we started the preparation back in May of this year.  On one of our first trips to the feed store after we closed on the farm we picked up this fellow.

He was admittedly an afterthought, but one we are glad we had.  He was the last turkey of the season for the feed store, but our first turkey at Vaughnshire.  Our oldest son quickly took on the responsibility of feeding and caring for this Broad Breasted Bronze.  Although, in my opinion there was not much to this.  This has to be the least problematic animal at Vaughnshire.  But even with such a stellar track record, his day was appointed… at last the day every turkey dreads the day of preparation for Thanksgiving.

Here is how the event unfolded.

“Children run out to the barn and bring the turkey up to the carport. 
Hurry, it looks like it might rain.”

Let’s Go Tom - Your Chariot Awaits

Into the Wagon - uhm I mean your chariot

We are Having a Parade in Your Honor

End of the Parade

The Beginning of a Thanksgiving Feast

The Unofficial Rough Weight 39.5 Pounds!

“…and they bore it between two upon a staff…” Numbers 13:23

OK, Let’s Get Those Pin Feathers

The Official Kitchen Weight 41.5 Pounds!

Now the real question is how do we cook this monster?  Stayed tuned for tomorrow’s exciting conclusion to The Monster Turkey - How big is our oven?

It seems that we continue to be derelict in our blogging duties.  We have had a month (or two) of intense business travel and our family dynamic has changed as well.  As such I thought it might be appropriate to post explaining why that has impacted our blogging time.

God in his infinite wisdom and benevolent grace has chosen to bless us with another child!  We are overwhelmed at His kindness toward us.  We recognize the truth of his word that says, children are a blessing from God and we readily accept this blessing and the responsibility to raise this child along with his or her 7 siblings in the nurture and admonition of our Lord.

At the same time, we recognize that all blessings are not easy in our flesh and Beth does work through the beginning of each pregnancy with much morning sickness.  This would account for the deficit of posts lately as she nourishes the new baby and the rest of us try to do our part as we earn a living and attempt to keep some order in the house.

We are home from the business travel for a short season and hope to catch the blog up with all the exciting things God has done here at vaughnshire and what the coming year may hold.  For now, please rejoice with us over this great news and consider God’s sovereign plan among the nations as he grants to those that love him the blessing of a children.

Gen 17:15-16  And God said unto Abraham, As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall her name be.  And I will bless her, and give thee a son also of her: yea, I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of people shall be of her.

 Gen 24:60 And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them.

Psa 127:1-5  A Song of degrees for Solomon. Except the LORD build the house, they labor in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep. Lo, children are a heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

As the seasons change, so does life and in our case it has been quite an eventful season change.  We have been extremely busy lately around here on the farm.  Fall has set in with a chill in the air and a feast of color.  We have several interesting posts on chicken tractors, milk barns, herbs, homeschooling, Thanksgiving turkey and the sort that are on the verge of being finished but as of yet have not been completed with the pictures.   

My husband preached a message in church several Sunday’s ago about the brevity of life.  He mentioned that we had recently visited the grave stones of our descendants 4 and 5 generations past and saw on each marker the date of birth and the date of death with what lies between being that short dash of physical life.  Is the life that we live today living to glorify God?  Are we advancing His kingdom here on earth in our mortal bodies?  Are we fixed upon the things above?

 As we prepare to leave tomorrow to attend the funeral of a friend and co-laborer in the advancement of Christ’s Kingdom, 19-year-old Michael Billings, we mourn a great loss while still trusting in the Sovereign hand of our Lord that He indeed has the time of our birth and the time of our death in His hands. 

“…You do not know what will happen tomorrow.  For what is your life?  It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.” James 4:14

Mr. Phillips offered a complete tribute to Michael.  In it he stated, “Michael was the oldest young man I ever met…”.  I have to say that when I read that I had to agree completely with such an accurate assessment.  He was indeed the most mature oldest young man I have ever met.  Were you to have met this young man, you would have been absolutely amazed by his maturity and composure.    He didn’t waste his youth in frivolous things or worldly losses.  He was a stalwart example of a youth well beyond his years living his life completely and solely for Christ’s Crown and none other. 

Our family’s last visit with Michael was several weeks ago when we took a trip to San Antonio to visit our dear friends the Grady family, Michael’s oldest sister and brother in-law.  Michael joined us at Church and we had fellowship with him  and the Grady’s over lunch and later on that day at the DeLadurantey home where we had encouraging discussions over a variety of subjects which included the men sitting around the living room discussing weighty topics of entrepreneurship, business, church, family and the usual topics that surround men that desire to be used of God to reform this culture.  

We met the Grady and Billings families at the Zes family’s famous 4th of July party several years prior where young Michael stood up and gave an incredible speech he had written at around the age of 15 or 16 and one which was well over most of our heads.  Since then we enjoyed listening to several other speeches and memorization pieces he had done at these 4th of July celebrations.  A powerful, in his own words, sermon he preached at the age of 17 tells more about Michael’s love and understanding of the Lord than any could explain in words.    I encourage you to listen to it:  Life is But a Vapor. 

May we be encouraged to raise such mighty warriors for Christ while yet still in their youth, that can and will do much damage to the kingdom of darkness. 

It is wonderful to have friends that embrace the narrow road and seek to live out the life of true Christianity.  Recently, my dear sister in Christ and good friend, Jennifer Grady, sent this quote to me that her children had found.  It says:

Though the cross of Christ has been beautified by the poet and the artist, the avid seeker after God is likely to find it the same savage instrument of destruction it was in the days of old. The way of the cross is still the pain-wracked path to spiritual power and fruitfulness.So do not seek to hide from it. Do not accept an easy way. Do not allow yourself to be patted to sleep in a comfortable church, void of power and barren of fruit. Do not paint the cross nor deck it with flowers. Take it for what it is, as it is, and you will find the rugged way to death and life. Let it slay you utterly. 

A.W. Tozer’s book The Radical Cross

For our own family, we thank God that He has surrounded us with friends who do not seek to hide from the cross of Christ but instead seek to embrace that rugged cross.  We praise God for friends that stand with us to encourage us with the uncompromising truth of the Gospel.  The Billings and Grady families have offered such support and encouragement to us over the years.  We are grateful for their love and support to our family and we are grateful that the Lord has knit our hearts together.  We grieve with them and stand by them as brothers and sisters in Christ during such a painful time. 

“And I heard a voice from heaven saying, “Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.” “Blessed indeed”, says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them!”  Revelation 14:13

 Mr. Nathaniel Darnell gives a wonderful tribute to his dear friend.