Healing Power of Raw Milk

For awhile now I have truly believed in the healing power of food. Food is medicine. Meaning food that is organic and as close to God's original creation will benefit us. If man gets in the way and tries to alter food the healing power seems to be, no, IS destroyed. I don't really know when it happened that man thought they could create something better than God. I have found this to be true from personal experience. Trying raw milk this summer confirmed my beliefs. Kaelyn was allergic to milk since she was a baby. When my health turned for the worst and I removed many foods from my diet, I found dairy was a big issue for me also. I was sad because I really liked dairy products. After cutting it out I kept getting this feeling that milk should work for me. But no matter what we tried from the store, like 100% grassfed homogenized butter, Kaelyn and I would both break out with rashes. I was frustrated. I had been doing quite a bit of health research around that time and had come across a few readings that several people with dairy allergies could actually tolerate raw milk. This was exciting news, but where could I get my hands on raw milk? A farm a couple hours away was already swamped with customers wanting his raw milk and my husband was not for raw milk at all due to safety health scares at that time. Since then my belief in the healing power of God's given food increased. I was watching and experiencing my own body heal through food, herbs and prayer. Hearing stories from my 92 year old grandma about her and her family drinking a lot of raw milk growing up really made me want to try it. Without going into much detail on my grandma, she does not seem her age, she is active, keeps up her own big house, gardens, and if her or her siblings happen to fall they bounce right back up. No broken bones! There has to be a good foundation for this type of exceeding health. Anyway as time went on I had a conversation with another couple about raw milk near our area. (Thank you June and Jason!!!) I kept the information in my mind. I had been feeling for quite awhile that we were not getting enough calcium in our diet. After seeing that my teeth were not looking so great... like some translucent spots on them I knew we HAD to get more calcium. That night I told my husband to please go to the nearby dairy farm and see if we could try some raw milk. He finally changed his mind and decided we could try it! Turns out the farm had one jug of milk that hadn't been spoken for and that we could try it. If it worked for us we would have to buy a cow share as required by state law at that time.

Well we tried it. I was nervous giving it to Kaelyn since she had always reacted very noticeably in the past to dairy. At first I blotted some milk on her wrist and then by her mouth. This is a good test to see if you are highly sensitive to a food. She did not react! So she drank some. She loved it and still did not react. Milk continued. My teeth looked better within 24 hours of drinking the milk and Kaelyn's eczema on the back of her arms was reducing! Praise the Lord for His good gifts! How he worked out a place to get it right near us and its healing qualities amazes me.
David has been stopping at the farm weekly for the last couple months+ to pick up our glass bottled milk. Last week we took a family trip to the farm. It was Kaelyn's and my first experience there. We were met by happy cows going to graze in the pasture, chickens and quite a few happy, healthy children. The kids were so full of energy and loving I couldn't keep from laughing. Kaelyn loved it there even though she was being pulled in all directions by the kiddos. :)

I am not saying raw milk will work for everyone. (Although raw goat and sheep milk is even easier tolerated than raw dairy as it is easier to digest.) If I had the milk before I eliminated a lot of the Candida in my system I'm not sure it would have gone over so well. I feel my body would have been too congested. It just happened that the timing was right and everything aligned. God had it planned out perfectly! So now we are enjoying raw milk every day. Yay! And what's even better, the state just changed its rules and we no longer have to own a cow share. Yep, we don't have to own part of the cow in order to get milk which means if we want more milk we can get it! So exciting... atleast for us! :)

Some may be wondering why raw milk works and not pasteurized dairy. The main reason is when raw milk is heated, beneficial bacteria and enzymes that the body needs are killed. Pasteurization prohibits the milk from working in the body the way it was originally meant to. Short explanation... the good is destroyed by the heat. Man, get the hint... DON'T mess with God's design and we would all be better off! End of rant.
More information on the health benefits of raw dairy vs pasteurized can be found on Dr. Mercola's site HERE.

One of the lessons I have learned is if something keeps coming up in your mind and you can't let it go, God wants you to do something with the information. He speaks differently to each person. Just listen, accept and do. Good will follow. :)

Have a awesome and blessed day!

Lake Superior

A few photos from our first big camping trip to Northern Wisconsin and Duluth, MN...

I love these family bikes. They always make me laugh!

 Beautiful sandy beach and clear water.

I never thought we would be able to eat at a restaurant on the trip. Plans were to always cook meals in our camper. Duluth had an awesome Whole Foods. Seriously wish it was located by our house! Anyway, we saw in a brochure about Tavern on the Hill and how they focus on healthy food and try to source their products from the nearby area. We checked out their menu online and thought they might have something Kaelyn and I could actually eat. To be honest I was nervous, but David was excited to give it a try. Our poor waitress had to go back and forth to the kitchen like 20 times with questions, but we were finally able to get a meal that worked for us. Yay and thank God! Here's what we had...

Turkey burger topped with caramelized onions and sprouts. Our side was smashed cauliflower. K and I both liked it! Great place to check out if you are in the Duluth area.

A couple Sundays ago the piano player at our church was telling a story about Jesus being like our lighthouse and what a rocky journey we may have to get to Him. I immediately thought of our trip and the path we had to take to get to the lighthouse. Walking on these jagged rocks of varying sizes was not so easy, it took quite a bit of time but oh how it related to our own life journey. Our stories are all so different but we are all given obstacles to overcome, to push through and hopefully through the journey we come closer to Christ who gives us light in our darkness. He's our hope and source of good things to come. ♥

We saw a number of things. We toured the William Irvin ship which was HUGE! Kaelyn did not like going to the top deck since it was so high up but atleast she enjoyed pretending to steer the ship once she was up there. Another highlight was the Heritage and Arts Center. It had something for everyone to enjoy... history, art show, kid play area, amazing train museum, detailed wood carved furniture plus more. Lake Superior area was a hard place to leave. We debated about taking another day to see more sights in the area but decided we would just have to go back when we had more time to explore. We are so thankful for the family adventure we had and look forward to seeing new sights next summer.

A Summer Glimpse

Wow, sorry for the extended blog silence. Hopefully everyone hasn't given up on me. 

I was thinking our summer would be a little slower and that just wasn't the case. 

Here are a few of our family's highlights from summer 2015...

 Lots of time experimenting and cooking in the kitchen. I have a great helper! :)

 Fishing time! Kaelyn and her Grandpa are the lucky ones.

Gardening sure takes a lot of time, but it is well worth the fresh, organic produce. This year my garden consisted of onions, butter lettuce, red romaine, garlic, cilantro, kale, collards, spinach, swiss chard, radishes, cabbage, cucumbers, green beans, celery, summer squash, zucchini, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, broccoli, dill and Kaelyn grew peas, ground cherries, sweet corn and a watermelon. I also grew a fair share of weeds... I just couldn't keep up!

Our biggest project was renovating a camper. We love to travel, but when our food issues were posing a real problem with travel plans we decided to find a camper so we could have a kitchen with us where ever we go. The whole process was quite a struggle and a humbling experience. We had no idea how quickly campers went up for sale and were sold right away. We inquired about quite a number but they were all sold before we could look at them. We absolutely fell in love with one and were going to travel several hours to get it. The guy promised to save it for us and wouldn't you know it was sold out from underneath us. It was an emotional roller coaster. We ended up finding an older one with the same layout though and thought it would be a fun, quick renovation project to get it how we wanted it. Ha! I should have learned my lesson by now, wallpaper hides many things really well! In renovating houses I have had a ceiling fall on my head... the wallpaper was hiding the cracks! In the camper, the wallpaper was hiding black mold! Uggh! Hubby spent a lot of time rebuilding and fixing window issues. There were a lot of late nights, sweat, and tears put into this project over most of the summer.

 One of the Bible school crafts I had the kids do. This year we had a safari theme.

K spent a lot of time at the pool. Her excuse was she needed a lot of practice for swimming lessons. It paid off because she passed no problem.

 Fun at the farm!

 EEK! We can tolerate milk! RAW milk that is. Praise the Lord! This will get its own post soon.

 Kaelyn did Plein Air Paint Out with me this year and had so much fun.

It was hard to get much artwork done with this little fur ball running around. For some reason he loved to get his nose in everything of ours. Pretty sure he thinks he's a dog! :)

Me and my girl. So thankful for feeling good! ♥

 Fourth of July... Kaelyn requested we go to the BIG show again.

At the end of summer our camper was finally ready to use for a few outings. 

Out of state we headed and God blessed us with wonderful family time, beautiful views and good weather...

Awe... so much better. Clean, light and airy.

 K loves her bunk bed.

Yes, the hard work was worth it! Being able to stop anywhere, anytime and cook your own healthy food is a huge blessing! The end even made me want to do another renovation project. Guess I will have to find some projects around the house. I already have ideas. :)

Some amazing views while out with the camper on our first trip...

K's first roller coaster experience and she insisted on going by herself. She had the most horrible expression on her face while riding I thought for sure she was in tears and screaming the entire time but when she got off and got her breathe, she said it was fun!

 Back to school. Summer went by way to quick!

Now that my firecracker is back in school and the garden produce is slowing down, I should be able to post more often. Definitely more health posts in the works.

Have a fabulous weekend!