Flashback: Organic Farming

This post was written a couple of years ago, at the tail end of apple picking season. It's another great option for picking your own apples this year. Have you been to Ferme Dagenais? by Misty

We made a recent trip to Ferme Dagenais in Embrun, Ontario, and exprienced a little taste of organic farming. Originally slated as an apple picking adventure, we quickly realized upon arrival that all the apples had been picked. We were given a long pole with metal prongs and a bag attached, and told "you might get some if you work really hard!"

farme_dagenais_organic_farming

When visiting a local farm, it's best to call ahead, even if you have taken the time to browse their website (many small farms don't even have websites). Pick-your-own produce tends to go fast, and it's disappointing to make a long trip only to come home empty handed.

Fortunately this trip was not a disappointing one, as we discovered many parts of the farm where our little girl could run and explore.

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Upon arrival, we were greeted by the sweet dog-in-residence. She followed us around the whole lot, occasionally flopping over for a belly rub.

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Next was the chicken coup, where we were greeted by the two lone geese and countless chickens.

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The donkey had his say, serenading us with extraordinarily loud "hee-haws." The little one found this hilarious.

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In addition to this, there were pasture and barns for goats, cows, and turkeys, and a coop for laying hens. I also noticed a beautiful experimental garden, bee hives and a little cage of rabbits.

Ferme Dagenais is a biodynamic farm - which attempts to balance the interrelationship between soil, plants and animals, while avoiding any external inputs (e.g. artificial fertilizers and pesticides). Although not every product may be certified organic, all things grown and sold from this farm are deemed "natural." When it comes to produce such as apples - one of the "dirty dozen" for their pesticide residues - it's sometimes worth the trip further outside of town.

As a bonus, we spent some time browsing the on-site natural food store "Le Tournesol," run by Osteopath Sylvain Dagenais.

To find out more about Ferme Dagenais, visit their website.

Rice Sand Box

by Erin

The end of outdoor sandbox weather is sadly on it's way.  Here's an idea on how to keep sandbox fun going all year round.

Making the rice

Just a quick note: we are using rice and food colouring for this project. Both are non-toxic and edible, although young children should still be monitored since ingesting even a few tablespoons of uncooked rice can be dangerous. A few grains won't harm anyone, though.

Get some rice - LOTS of rice. I only used 4 x 600g bags, but for a "sandbox" you'll need 10-15 times that. I suggest you go to Costco.

You'll want about ¾ of a bottle of food colouring for every 500g of rice. The more food colouring you use, the brighter and deeper the colours you'll wind up with - if you want muted pastels, use ½ a bottle or less. You can also mix the food dye for custom colours, you're really only limited by your imagination and your patience. For this sample, I used the Neon stuff.

Rice Sandbox1

Essentially, we'll be combining the food colouring with the (uncooked) rice and kneading it to spread it through as many of the grains as possible. A plastic zippered food storage bag comes in VERY handy for this step.

Rice Sandbox2

TIPS:

• Adding the food colouring to the bag before adding the rice makes it easier to get good coverage (as opposed to what is shown in my image).
• Dye the rice in small batches, DO NOT overfill the zippered bag.
• Dollar store zippered bags won't cut it for this activity, you'll need something sturdier.
• Allow rice to dry completely before touching it with bare hands. The food dye will come off on your fingers and stain your clothes.

Rice Sandbox3

Repeat this procedure as necessary. You'll want to use a fresh zippered bag for each batch. You might want to consider dyeing ½ the rice and leaving the rest un-dyed, for the sake of saving some time, and your sanity.

Containing the rice

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So now that you have made a rainbow of rice grains, dump any un-dyed rice into the bottom of a large, shallow plastic storage container. I like the ones designed for underbed storage because they have little casters making set up and put away easier on my back. Next, add all the coloured rice, you can either dump it all in, or you can artistically arrange it, as I did in the sample container.

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Playing with the rice

I set the sandbox up with typical toys: shovel, pail, dump truck, animal figurines. The toys you add will depend on the age of the child(ren) playing in the sandbox.

Obviously, the colours will not stay separated, but we're not creating an art installation here. Unless that's what you really want, in which case, place your container out of the reach of children, and cats. Seriously about the cats, you do not want to ever leave the sandbox uncovered and unattended. Trust me.

After playtime is over, you will have to vacuum up some stray rice grains.

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Reserve a half cup of each colour to use in future art projects - think glitter, but WAY less messy.  I have another post coming soon on what you can do with this batch of rice.

UPDATED TO ADD: "I found out that you can add a few teaspoons of rubbing alcohol to the food colouring to make kneading it through the rice grains easier. It also decreases the drying time before you can play with the rice without danger of staining your fingers and/or clothing."

Erin Marshall is an Angel Mama and a SAHW. Two days a week she uses her Amazing Auntie super powers to keep up with her 20-month old nephew, Xavier; the rest of her time is split between being an editor/proofreader, artist and blogger. 

Flashback: Apple Picking At South Mountain Apple Orchard

by Natasha

Apple season is upon us - do you go apple picking?  What's your favourite place?

You can tell that fall is just around the corner when the Apple Orchards are open and buzzing with people.  Whether you are out to pick the delicious fruit to make the perfect pie, apple crisp or just simply enjoy an apple as is, the apple orchard is the perfect outing.

We recently visited Mountain Orchard with our family and friends. It is located just 10 minutes outside of Kemptville.  Our family and friends had a great time picking delicious, juicy LOBO and Macintosh apples.

When you arrive, there is wagon ride to take you out into the orchard to pick your apples.  Mountain Orchard has Lobo, Macintosh, Spartan, Cortland, Eden, Empire, Honey Gold, Silkin, and Honeycrisp.   Depending on when you go to pick apples each type may not be available based on the growing season.

Mountain Orchard has a ton of great activities to offer families.

There is a cute little park beside the store that parents can sit and relax, sip their apple cider and watch their kids play on the swings.

The whole family can explore the giant corn maze.  It’s a barrel of laughs running around trying to find your way out.  Kids can also roll and jump around in the stack of straw.

They have the most delicious apple donuts I have ever eaten, called Apple Cider Dougnuts - YUM! Mountain Orchard is open daily from 9am to 5pm starting at the end of August and the season concludes Thanksgiving weekend.

Make sure to call ahead to avoid disappointment!

Summer of Awesome - Pinto Valley Ranch

So my girls are still heavily into horses, and the Olympics did not help matters any. So to (hopefully) further dissuade them against the whole idea, I took them out to Pinto Valley Ranch. The ranch is located in Fitzroy Harbour, which makes it a bit of a hike - it's about 1/2 hour north of Kanata. What makes it worth it, though, is that it's one of the few places around where amateurs can have a go at horseback riding.

They have several ponies on hand for younger kids. You can pick out a pony, then take a 10 minute or 20 minute ride around the paddock - your pony will be guided on the ground by an experienced rider, and your child will just be able to get the feel of a gentle walk and enjoy visiting with the horses.

Once you hit 11 years old, you're old enough to qualify for their trail rides. The trail rides are for all levels of riders - their horses are seriously so gentle and easy that even total beginners will be safe and sound. The horses and riders travel as a group along a pretty trail for about an hour, so you and your child can get a good feel for what it means to be on horseback.

The ranch is a quiet, laid back kind of place. It's not like other in-town attractions, where you're running from one high-octane activity to the next. Besides the horse riding, there's nothing "to do," per se.

But just being out on the farm was a surprisingly fun experience for the kids. There are plenty of animals about - llamas and goats, funny loud roosters in a pen, pigs that are allowed to roam free (my kids LOVED them), kittens in the barn. If you're lucky, you might bump into a free-running peacock or two. You're free to walk up and down the stalls in the barn, too, visiting quietly with the horses, stroking then on the nose, imagining you own one and it sleeps in your bedroom and you ride it to school every day and Mommy, can I please please please have a horse???

Sigh.

There's a small tuck shop where you can sit inside and have a snack, and buy treats or drinks. There's plenty of outdoor toys for little ones to explore. It's quite pleasant to just sit and enjoy the barn smells and sounds. A slow-going afternoon in the country, if you will.

We were there for about 2 1/2 hours total - enough time for a pony ride, a snack, a visit with the other animals...and then another pony ride. I am a sucker.

If you are at all interested in the ranch, now is the time to go, and I mean like now, today. The ranch is facing some hard times right now - first of all, the drought this summer has caused a massive hay shortage in the area, and the ranch is looking at selling up to half its horses to make ends meet. Secondly, the owners' kids are all in full day school now, so they're starting to wonder when (or if) it's time to hang up the saddles. It's too bad, as it's the perfect place to introduce a possible horse-loving child to these kind, gentle animals.

Also I should mention, they have day camps all summer long where your child can spend a week learning basic horse handling skills in the summer; and in the winter, you can head on out for a sleigh ride (advanced booking required).

So go, now, today, while you still have a chance to support this great local business.

Some important details: The day camps run in the mornings, so the rides are only open to the public from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. in the afternoons. You can show up any time for a pony ride; trail rides run in the summer on this schedule. IMPORTANT NOTE: if the temperature is above 30 degrees, rides for that day are cancelled due to the weather being too dangerous for the animals. They're open every day in the summer, then Thursdays through Sundays for September and October.

The pony rides are $10 for 10 minutes, $20 for 20 minutes; trail rides are $40 per rider (no double riders allowed). A wee bit expensive, but it's the only expense you'll have there, and it was SO worth it to my girls.

Shout out to Ponyboy and DotCom - best horses ever. You'll live forever in my daughter's dreams.

Lynn is mom to three tombliboos and blogs over at Turtlehead.

Summer of Awesome - Mini Golf Gardens

It took me years, years to admit that I have a secret love: mini golf. Oh, I try to play it cool, act like it's no big thing, it's "for the kids." But I have to admit that it's me who loves the putt putt. It's not even about the competition or the personal challenge of achieving par or the thrill of the hole-in-one. It's just about the mental challenge of calculating the angles. And also, the little coloured balls. I'm a junkie.

So I took the kids to check out Mini Golf Gardens, which is an outdoor mini putt place at the corner of Merivale and Colonnade, that's only open in the summer months (April through October). It's straight up mini golf here; two courses, each 18 holes, and nothing else. Just you, the putter, and open expanses of fake green grass.

Heaven.

Both courses are really pretty, with waterfalls and streams and trees, and also well thought out. It's not the kind of place with giant windmills and or loop-the-loops for the balls. Instead, the course relies more on wacky bumps, bridges, and barriers to make it interesting. I personally found the two courses to be the perfect combination of challenging and fun. The kids were well able to handle it - my nine-year-old and seven-year-old were able to get par a few times, and finished the courses in about 65 strokes, which is not too shabby.

The five-year-old did a lot of stick-handling moves with her putter. We were down with that, too. Meanwhile, I got three holes-in-one. I ROCKED it.

It's a lovely little course, a nice place to spend a morning or afternoon outside, and a good challenge for both kids and adults. It will take you about an hour and a half to do both courses. Plus, I'd recommend stopping halfway through for a visit to the tuck shop, which features ultra-rare banana slushies, along with other drinks and treats. It's a little exposed in spots, so be sure to wear sunscreen and bring hats.

Mini Golf Gardens is probably not the cheapest miniputt in town - $9 adults, $7.50 for kids under 12. But for a junkie like me, it was well worth it - definitely my favourite of all the courses we've done in Ottawa.

We'll be back. I have like, five other ball colours to get through!

Lynn is mom to three tombliboos and blogs over at Turtlehead.