The Freckled Farm Soap Company

Tag: goat

Getting to Know The Freckled Farm – Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Want to know more about the farmers, animals, and buildings on The Freckled Farm? Every Friday I will introduce you to another part of The Freckled Farm. This week you have a chance to get to know Ruth Bader Ginsburg!

On The Freckled Farm our animals are named by themes. The llamas are named after mountains, the chickens are named after 80s and 90s sitcom characters, and our goats are named after strong, intelligent women that we love and admire.

Back in the fall we reserved two kid does for this spring from a farm in Louisa. We were really hoping to get a doe from a specific breeding (the dam and sire throw beautiful kids), but you never know what you are going to get so we were prepared to take kids from any of their breedings. We were overjoyed when spring rolled around and we got an email saying that the breeding resulted in one doe and one buck, and since we were first in line she would be available to us. Our second doe would come from one of the other breedings. Once all of the does kidded we visited the farm to make our pick. The doe from our chosen breeding was beautiful, as we expected. There was no doubt that we would pick her. The second pick came from a breeding of one of the past kids of our choice breeding. We ended up with two really beautiful girls.

Ruth joined The Freckled Farm in June. She is an absolutely beautiful doe. Her markings are incredible. She is sweet and playful as most kids are, but I have a feeling that as she gets older that she might challenge Tina for the alpha position. Even at her small size she has attempted to assert her authority when she was being pushed around by either pushing back or stomping her hooves in protest. She may one day take the position of our alpha goat.

The Freckled Farm Soap Company makes handmade goat milk soaps. Our body care products are all natural and made with love. For more information about our products and to read more about the farm please visit our website: www.thefreckledfarmsoapcompany.com

September 20, 2013
Getting to Know The Freckled Farm – Hillary Clinton

Want to know more about the farmers, animals, and buildings on The Freckled Farm? Every Friday I will introduce you to another part of The Freckled Farm. This week you have a chance to get to know Hillary Clinton!

On The Freckled Farm our animals are named by themes. The llamas are named after mountains, the chickens are named after 80s and 90s sitcom characters, and our goats are named after strong, intelligent women that we love and admire.

Oh my sweet Hillary. She is so loving, so affectionate, so intelligent, and a true attention hog. Hillary follows me around the pasture as I do farm chores, anything to get some attention. She has such a sweet, calm personality (except at feeding time) that most of our visitors fall in love with Ms. Hillary instantly. People also love her beautiful white freckled ears. When we moved the baby goats into the pasture a few weeks ago instead of pushing them around, like Tina did, she explored them with gentle curiosity. Don’t get me wrong, if they were in her way she would let them know, but is was with a gentle push instead of an aggressive head butt. She is our sweet girl. We love her so much.

The Freckled Farm Soap Company makes handmade goat milk soaps. Our body care products are all natural and made with love. For more information about our products and to read more about the farm please visit our website: www.thefreckledfarmsoapcompany.com

September 13, 2013
Getting to Know The Freckled Farm – Tina Fey

Want to know more about the farmers, animals, and buildings on The Freckled Farm? Every Friday I will introduce you to another part of The Freckled Farm. This week you have a chance to get to know Tina Fey!

On The Freckled Farm our animals are named by themes. The llamas are named after mountains, the chickens are named after 80s and 90s sitcom characters, and our goats are named after strong, intelligent women that we love and admire.

I am starting with Tina Fey because she is the alpha. All herds have them and Tina is ours. She is truly a “Bossy Pants.” She bosses everyone around… Well not me, but that’s not from lack of trying.

When the barn was complete and the fencing was in progress I began to look for a farm that had a few available yearlings. We hadn’t planned on getting goats until spring, but with the farm structures coming to completion I wasn’t willing to wait any longer. I searched for a while but most of the local farms had already sold off any available goats that spring. I finally found a farm not far from us that had eight doelings from two different breedings for us to pick from. I knew there was no way that I would go and not find at least two goats that I liked, so it really started to sink in that the goats we saw that day would be the start of our farm. On the drive there Kevin and I discussed how we would know which goats to get. I had waited my whole life for this day (no exaggeration), so I wondered if I would just know which goats were ours or if it would solely be an educated decision based on the goats structure and the history of the dam and sire. We had visited several farms that year and even had reservations to get 2 kid does in the spring, but we had never had the experience of going to a farm and saying “We will take those two,” so the excitement that surrounding this farm visit was very different than in the past. We got to the farm and the owner walked us through the property. We walked passed the dog pen, the buck kid pen, the big buck pasture, and up to the adult doe pasture. She pointed towards the pasture where the doelings were. I looked over and there they were, standing up against the fence and there was one doe who just struck me. It was like she was lit up. I knew she was mine. That goat was Tina.

When we first brought Tina home she was a goof ball. She would prance and hop around the pasture, but as we continued to add animals and it was no longer just her and Hillary she began to show a dominate side. She still has her goofy moments, but she rules the roost and is quite serious most of the time. She may be a bossy one, but towards me she is loving and affectionate… sometimes aggressively so. She has dimples near her mouth that make it look like she is always smiling. We love her… bossiness and all.

The Freckled Farm Soap Company makes handmade goat milk soaps. Our body care products are all natural and made with love. For more information about our products and to read more about the farm please visit our website: www.thefreckledfarmsoapcompany.com

September 6, 2013
Why Soap?
“Do you make cheese?” This is THE question people ask when they find out we have a diary goat farm and when we tell them no (at least not to sell), that we make goat milk soap they generally look at us puzzled. No one can seem to understand why we would rather make soap than delicious goat cheese. Well there are a number of reasons we made this decision:
1. Creativity – Kevin and I are both artists. In fact, we met while attending VCU School of the Arts, where we were both working towards photography degrees. While I am sure there are plenty of creative things that you can do with cheeses we felt that soap would really allow our creativity to shine. The possibilities are endless and we would be able to expand the business into a huge assortment of natural body care products.
2. Soap’s lifespan – Our goal is for our farm to help financially support us throughout the year. Soap lasts a long time and you don’t have to worry about short expiration dates. This way we can sell at the same pace year round and if we don’t sell all of our product at a market one week it can go with us to the market the next. At some point we will have the breeding staggered to the point where we are never without fresh milk, but until that happens we can still run our business even when our girls are near the end of their pregnancies and not milking because the milk is frozen and the soap lasts.
3. Our commitment to natural and raw – It’s easy to have our soaps natural and raw. We use raw milk, we use essential oils never synthetic fragrances, and we never use artificial dyes. With cheese it’s a little harder. Unless your cheese is aged a certain number of days you are not allowed to use raw milk, so any soft cheeses have to be made with pasteurized milk. We are passionate about raw milk around here and have no desire to pasteurize.
4. Facilities – The soap making requires pretty minimal facilities. To have a true dairy operation you have to have specific facilities and go through a process of inspections. While I don’t have a problem going through the hoops needed to make our business legit, the costs of building the cheese facilities is no where in our budget… especially an aging room.
5. Product Quality – After using our soap you will understand. Goat milk soap is superior. We are proud to have the opportunity to make such an awesome product.
6. Passion – Kevin and I both are very visually driven. We are extremely excited about making beautiful soaps, packaging, etc, and while we consider ourselves foodies and are very passionate about eating healthy and well, we don’t have a passion for cheese. I could sit and look through soap recipes, read books about soap, and browse images of beautiful soap on Pinterest all day long.
Soapmaking is just a better fit for our family, lifestyle, and personalities. I hope that after using our soap people understand why we are so passionate about it!

The Freckled Farm Soap Company makes handmade goat milk soaps. Our body care products are all natural and made with love. For more information about our products and to read more about the farm please visit our website: www.thefreckledfarmsoapcompany.com
August 5, 2013