Late Summer 2026 around Cobblestone Farm

I can feel the temperature shifting and I’m already getting ready for autumn. Though here on the Saskatchewan Prairies, that likely means 1 day, then, boom and winter hits lol! Hopefully with an El Niño forecast we should have a milder winter than the last few years.

We finally have some piglets (and more goat babies) on the ground!

We had a very poor start to the year on the piglet front. Our boar wasn’t doing his job. No boar means no piglets! We had no piglets for sale in spring and this also meant that our early 2027 pork production will be limited.

Though having no pigs and pork for sale is a terrible financial blow for us, it did force us to focus on taking a break.

We now have piglets on the ground, and of course we are not escaping the weather challenges we get in spring. The rain is making quagmires and one of the sows is particularly picky about where she and her piglets sleep. The first week she was very hormonal and although not aggressive - we did exercise extreme caution around her. She would not move from the pit she had dug herself near a trailer. This would have been fine until the massive downpours we got, forcing the piglets to shelter under the trailer where they were easier prey for coyotes taking advantage of the fact our Livestock Guardian Dog hides in the porch when there is a storm.

We finally got her into the quonset, where she is free to leave but seems to have decided this is a far better place than her self made water pit.

The goats also live in the quonset so it has been a bit of a juggling act. While the pigs don’t generally bother with the goats, pigs are omnivores and with a goat due to kid (give birth), that would have been a recipe for disaster.

All worked out well - I managed to get the goat in a safe pen where she had 2 kids that are soo cute!

In the Kitchen

Soap Making

With the Berkshires being a lard breed we are lucky enough to have an abundance of pork fat. While I mostly render it for cooking, it is only Carl and I and there are only so many chips we can, or should - eat! So I finally had time to have a go at making soap, I have been wanting to try this for years and now that we have goats on the farm, there is also spare goats’ milk to use in my soap too.

I actually love making soap and it is such a great product. I’ve made batches both with and without the goat milk, and both have turned out exceptionally well. Unlike commercial soaps, it doesn't have a long list of chemical ingredients—it's just simple soap that cleans and naturally softens your skin. Carl even had comments from a local mechanic on how soft his hands looked! If that isn't a testament to it being a good product, I don't know what is.

We also finally got around to redesigning the garden and I love it. We don’t do lawn mowing so we gravelled our garden, and put in flower beds and raised vegetable beds, focusing on only a few things this year so as not to get overwhelmed.

Carl did a potato growing experiment with some potato peelings that had sprouted. He just threw them down and covered them with a bit of soil and they grew!

Discovering Water Kefir

Why has no one told me about this stuff? I have heard about home made probiotic drinks like kombucha and milk kefir but not water kefir.

Lately, I’ve been experimenting with it and we love it, it’s so easy to brew it’s my new favourite thing to make.

If you’ve never tried brewing it, water kefir is a wonderful alternative to commercial sodas - it’s a lightly fermented, naturally bubbly drink made using water, sugar and kefir grains - they are a living, symbiotic colony of beneficial bacteria and yeast (SCOBY) that are soft, translucent, gelatinous, and squishy grains.

I’ve been working with a basic first-ferment ratio - using organic sugar, a hint of sea salt or a date to keep the grains happy and then doing a secondary ferment with ginger and lemon or fruit for natural fizz. It’s quick and easy to make and delicious to drink.

If you make it I’d love to know what secondary ferments are your favourites.

Planning Chutneys for Christmas

Our tomato beds are like jungles. With tons of tomatoes coming I will be making green tomato and apple chutney - I always forget and only remember about 2 weeks before Christmas when it is too late so I am doing that in the next week or so on the rainy days we have forecast. I once made one that tasted like Branston pickle - I need to find that recipe!

If you have a favourite green tomato chutney you want to share feel free to drop it in the comments!