Ninja Cow Farm LLC

One of the joys of being gone is that we get to come home to lots of progress on the store expansion. It’s like magic seeing so much done at once. 

This was how the store expansion looked just before we left to go on vacation. The new walls were framed. The door you see in the distance is the current back door to the store. 

This is how it looks now. The walls are in, insulated, and dry walled on the inside. The interior wall is gone and plastic hangs in its place. The new custom doors we ordered are in (leaning on the left) and waiting to be installed. The new storage area above is also floored and roughly ready for use. 

The view inside the store. This is the area that will be the new expansion. Drywall is in and mudded. The ceiling and electrical are in. Now it’s sand, clean up, sand clean up, then finally paint.

Another shot of the inside. Note the support beam in the center. Those beams are structural so we had to leave them in place. I’m sure they’ll be in the way of something, but I think they add to the rustic, barn look of our store. We’ll hang some cool stuff on them, I’m sure, once we start decorating and moving in product.

Just another peek behind the plastic. There is still a lot of work to do.

Construction always takes so little time compared to all the interior work. But once we move the freezers out, move the random stuff out and get it stored, and paint. We should be pretty close to usable. Then we get to organize and decorate which will be its own process. Plus I’m looking at all kinds of new goodies to bring into the store so that will be a process as well.

Hopefully by March we’ll be up and running. That seemed like an easy goal when we started this back in January. Now March is right around the corner!

Gold star to whoever knows what that title is from.

The word I’m referencing is VACATION!

Wait, what? Farmers don’t take vacations!

This one does.

Ever since I sold my company in 2015 and started farming full time, I’ve been trying to make up for all the years where I would not, under any circumstance, take a vacation. Maybe a couple of days at the beach. If I wasn’t busy. And no promises, because I may back out at the last minute, which I did about 95% of the time. I probably made it on our “planned vacations” about once every three years, maybe.

Now, since 2015, we take a vacation somewhere warm and take the whole family. It’s our annual/semi-annual treat. However, we couldn’t do it without help. LOTS of help. So thank you Miguel and Vicente for running the farm and keeping everything not only running, but actually improving while I was gone. A special thanks to those guys because they had to deliver a cow, and pick up kefir, two things they’ve not done before because I always do it.

Thank you Lucy and Erin for not only keeping the store running, but Lucy for making all of my farmer pickups, calling on our restaurant customers, feeding our fish, picking us up at the airport, etc.

Thank you Erin for keeping milk flowing and in the store.

Thank you Tamryn for keeping milk flowing from our other farm.

Thank you Christy from Brittany Ridge Farm for not only keeping our chicken and eggs flowing, but for letting me pay you when I got back (Farmers don’t give terms, it’s COD baby!)

Thank you Dustin for getting my mail, dropping us off at the airport, and generally keeping an eye on things.

While I was gone, we learned that my new cell service provider doesn’t provide cell service where we were. That meant I had no access to voice mail, texts, etc. I did get internet, sometimes, so I was able to reply but if you texted me and didn’t hear back, that’s why. My apologies. I hadn’t expected that issue.

Crazy picture lady (also known as She Who Must Be Obeyed, SWMBO) has somewhere between 1.2 and 1.3 million photos which are to be processed. I had 1. So here is my picture of our vacation.

We had fun. But we are GLAD to be home. So glad that the kids are going to be in the store today, all day, like normal. Spork has multiple tours lined up and Crystal will be in the store as well so it’s a normal farm day for our first day back. It’s also going to be gorgeous so stop by and stock up on goodies and ask the kids about their vacation. I’m sure they’d love to tell you about it.

Recently I’ve been trying to figure out ways to free up time here on the farm. You always have to look at what you are doing and if it adds value or not. Does it make sense for me to do things that Miguel does when there are things only I do that everybody is waiting for? No. Does it make sense for Miguel to do things that we can have someone else do? No. It’s all about pushing tasks down the ladder and making sure everyone is doing the things that provide the most return for their time (and payroll).

One of the things I was doing routinely was driving our monthly cardboard to the recycler. It took about 1/2 of a day, all in. That’s if everything went smoothly, which sometimes happened, sometimes not. It also sent me down major, busy roads with a huge trailer that was loaded to the max, and honestly beyond. What if I had a wreck? What if I blew a tire? Was this really the best way to spend my time when they offer a pickup service, even though there is a charge? Nope.

So we started collecting more than our normal cardboard, knowing that there would be a minimum amount for a pickup with a great big tractor trailer. But not really knowing what that minimum was we just kind of guessed. Miguel was guessing 30 bales, which sounded good to me. At 24 bales I finally bothered to call them and see about a pickup. It turns out, as usual, I should have called first. They will pick up 10 bales, no problem. As in, once per month like we’ve been doing. Oops. But they’d come get our 24 bales and clean us up and we’d go forward from there.

Once the truck driver got here and loaded the first few bales, he commented, “Those are some heavy bales.” Yeah, about 1900 lbs each. He’s driving a tractor trailer, I figured he’d load all my cardboard and make another stop.

“Yeah, I’m going to be overweight with this load.”

Uh oh. I guess we are packing our bales a little bigger than the normal farm, or even factory. I seem to recall they wanted a minimum of 500 pounds per bale when we first started. We are at 1900 lbs. Sometimes 2200 lbs. I always forget we have an unusually large compactor compared to, well, normal people. I guess sending 45,000 lbs of cardboard on one load may have been a bit much.

Oh well, it all worked out, and I didn’t have to take it myself.

Now! What else can I get out of around here?

This past week, we finished construction on the new freezer room. The wiring is done, the building is done, the exhaust fan is installed, and the new door is built and hung. Even the lights are in. The only thing left to do is to install the new door between the store and this new room, paint the exterior, and move the freezers into the room.

The new door takes a while to show up. We still have a few weeks before its arrival. Painting the exterior is just one of those things we’ll do as we finish up.

Moving the freezers is going to be an all hands on deck affair. Each freezer is stuffed with beefy and porky goodness. All of which will have to be removed while the freezer is being moved. My plan is to acquire a new freezer so that when we pull all the meat out of one, we can stuff it in an empty freezer. Then we can move the now empty freezer in, clean it up, and have it be the recipient of the next batch. It should work, if I can just find the right freezer.

We’ve now started working on the expansion to the retail area that will be behind the store. A goodly portion of that job is already done. However this job is a bit more complex so I expect it to take a few weeks to perform. We have to get it built, then tear down the back wall to the store so we don’t interrupt your shopping.

In the mean time, we have everything as normal, including pet milk, so stop on by today and see the girls who will be working along with SWMBO.

When I was picking up cheese and gelato at one of our favorite farms this week, I found out they had some serious cuteness hidden in the back. It was kidding season at Celebrity Goat Dairy and they already had kids on the ground.

I was given a quick tour through the barns, some of which are from the 1800s, to see the mammas and baby goats.

Some of them were still wet, having just been born.

The moms who hadn’t given birth yet looked like this. Like they’d swallowed four watermelons. They were HUGE!

So what does this have to do with Valentines day? Celebrity Goat Dairy is having an open barn event on February 11th and 12th where you can see all the new born goats, eat in their awesome dining area in the Inn, and even buy their goodies right there at the farm.

Now personally, I don’t like goats. But these little baby goats are CUTE! If you are looking for something different to do with the Mrs. for Valentine’s day, then this is a great option.

If you do decide to go, please tell Brit I sent you. They are great people and I want to support them all I can.

This week I picked up five HUGE hogs from the processor. Some weighed over 400 pounds. Loading all that porky goodness required a trip in our 24′ freezer truck, both to keep it frozen and to have enough room.

Thanks to our friend Mike at Brew N Que in Cary and now just opened in Apex (Go Mike!) we had three extra hogs to process. One was just broken down into 6 sections (the plastic bags on the left), one was broken down and deboned (the long boxes on the right) and then ours and his normal cuts in all the boxes in the back. It was neat handling some whole animals for a change of pace vs. the boxes of pork chops and sausage we normally get.

The only thing we didn’t get this week was bacon, but we’ll be picking that up next week so no worries. In the mean time, we have plenty of sausage, including GROUND PORK for all of you who were waiting on it. We already had it on order, but SWMBO came up short last week and things got real! She Who Must Be Obeyed is not to be trifled with when she’s cooking. 🙂

We are open 8-5 today and the girls are working so stop by and stock up. You can also walk out and see Henry and see how he’s doing. No tour needed. Just make sure you have some bananas for momma. 

Our store was originally just a room in the barn where we stored horse tack back when I was a kid. Then it was used as a general purpose room for many, many years.

Almost two years ago, (March 2015) we demoed the old room and freshened it up to be a real store. We were forced to do something because a water line had burst in the ceiling in February and flooded the room. But it was past time to update anyway so no big deal.

This picture is from when we were building out the store you all know. Note the air conditioner in the window. That’s the same window the Princess is hammering beside in the first picture.

This week, we started new construction on part of our addition. Note the back side of the air conditioner. That’s the same window that has been in all three pictures. We are going out the back wall, behind the counter, and pretty much doubling our space.

Don’t get excited yet though. This area won’t be used for customers. It will be used for storage and for backup freezers. You’ve all seen us scurry into the barn to retrieve some extra bit of goodness because even though we have four huge freezers/refrigerators in the store, we have that many more in the back for extra stock. And we need a couple more for even more storage. This room will now house all of our non-display freezers. What I call the overflow freezers. We also don’t have anywhere to store things like our Ninja Cow Farm shirts or our extra scarves.

We aren’t just adding storage though. We are doubling the customer portion of the store as well. But that is phase two of the build. We are going to expand out the rear wall of the store, to have room for more display area for items like our new corn meal. This expansion should double the inside portion of the store allowing us a lot more room for new items and customers on busy days. 

I’m also looking at adding a lot more items going forward. This time, we are going to be adding things that will display well on the shelf. Things that are canned or are in jars. I’m still working with some new folks to bring in new items, talking to different people, seeing what they offer and how it fits in with what we already do. I’m busy getting samples and trying them out with our family and the other taste testers here on the farm. There is a vetting process for anything we add, as usual.

We have a little time to pick what we want because we first need to finish our new storage room. Then we have to build out the entire back section of the store (more on that when it starts), drywall, paint, put in lighting, electrical, move the freezers, add new freezers, build/buy new shelving, move all the stock around, and then bring in stock. The next few months should be busy and exciting. It’s always fun bringing in new stuff.

Stay tuned for updates. Or even better, stop by and we’ll show you what we are doing! We are open today from 2-6 and tomorrow from 8-5. We also have plenty of pet milk available.

Having cute little calves is awesome. But having cute little milk calves is doubly so because we can now start milking again.

Yesterday Hedy received her first post birth milking. And believe me, she was HAPPY! The extra attention of milking is always welcome, but also being able to finally not have so much milk must have felt wonderful. Little Henry cannot begin to use all the milk Hedy produces and she was bursting at the seams.

We are slowly bringing out milk supply back to normal. That means for all you long suffering customers whose pets have been doing without or with limited supplies, we are now going to have regular milk supplies again. Expect there to be gallons in the fridge this coming Wednesday and going forward.

Thank you to everyone who has suffered the winter time dry-off with us. We are finally back in business on milk.

And for your human needs, we are still going to be stocking our normal pasteurized whole and chocolate milk, heavy cream, butter, etc.

I received a call a few months back from the NCDA wanting to know if we’d be willing to participate in a program they had going on. The idea was they were asking well known food bloggers to visit NC farms and then write about their experience. The catch was, we needed to comp them some goodies. Well sure, why not. It’s not like we do a lot of advertising and it’s not like we don’t already do tours all the time anyway.

The visit was scheduled back before Thanksgiving and it now being the middle of January I’d kind of forgotten about the whole thing. But yesterday I received an email from our blogger that her post had gone live. It’s always a bit nerve wracking to read what someone else has to say about you. Thankfully, Kate did a wonderful job telling our story. I just wish she’d Photoshopped some hair on my head in my picture. Oh well, next time. 🙂

You can read the write up here at this link.