Wheat has been a staple food in the world for approximately 10,000 years, so has it really changed that much, even in the last 100 years, to deserve allegations of causing various health problems? To warrant a boom in the gluten-free industry — an increase of $632.6 million in nine years? To be vilified in mainstream media the way it has?

I have read claims that wheat is less nutritious, that it has been modified too much and the author of the book Wheat Belly, even goes so far as to call modern wheat the “perfect, chronic poison.”

Wheat is near and dear to my heart. We are one of 11,000 wheat growers in Alberta and wheat is grown on 7.1 million acres in this province alone. When wheat takes a beating, I want to investigate where the claims come from and if they’re true or not, and most importantly — what does the science say?

The traits in wheat that have changed since the heritage varieties are: shorter and stronger plants, plants that have adapted better to growing conditions and plants that use water more efficiently, according to researchers Drs. Ames, Edwards and DePauw. These traits came from Dr. Norman Borlaug, the father of the Green Revolution. As a result of his accomplishments to prevent hunger and famine around the world, it is said that Borlaug has “saved more lives than any other person who has ever lived.”

The wheat of today has not only been changed to improve the adaptability to grow, but the varieties in Canada have been developed to preserve good baking and milling quality by improving on dough strength and water absorption, which means more loaves of bread for the same quantity of flour.

Dr. Rex Newkirk, VP of research and innovation at the Canadian International Grains Institute (Cigi), says that protein is what makes wheat functional; it’s the difference between wheat and rice (which is just a starch). Gluten gives wheat functionality by allowing it to “stay together.” The chain of proteins in gluten creates a matrix of gas bubbles to form during the fermentation process, to expand and hold their shape in bread dough, instead of escaping. Bagels need more gluten, as they have a chewier texture, Dr. Lawandi a PhD chemist-turned-baker explains, as well as how more of your favourite wheat products require different amounts of gluten for various textures and desired traits.

“Proteins are a way of measuring how much gluten is in wheat, but it’s a broad category,” says Newkirk. High-protein levels could mean low-quality wheat; adversely you could have low-quantity protein and high-quality wheat. There are several kinds of protein in wheat, and there are several ways of measuring it, but it all comes down to functionality — how well does it hold together? Cigi takes the wheat, turns it into flour and then into a dough and measures and tests it.

In Canada, we separate wheat into different classes based on the functionality and quantity of protein, with the most popular wheat being Canadian Western Red Spring (CWRS) wheat. CWRS is known for its excellent milling quality and is used for production of high-volume pan bread and is also used alone or in blends for hearth bread, steamed bread, noodles, flatbread, and common wheat pasta, according to the Canadian Grain Commission.

So — modern wheat won’t give you “wheat belly.” (Sorry, I couldn’t help myself.)

But seriously, in terms of protein and gluten, wheat has essentially not changed since the way our ancestors grew it. What has changed is that it maintains nutritional components better than older varieties and it has been bred to grow shorter, yield higher and has broad adaptations to growing conditions. Wheat shouldn’t be feared, it should be understood.

The post So what’s the story on modern wheat? appeared first on Grainews.

Sometimes I reflect in awe of how they did it all with so much less than what I have today. I have often been told from my mom, that in my grandma’s generation you “just didn’t talk about feelings,” and sucked it up and dealt with it.

I did suck it up and deal with it. I did it for so many years, and the last of which I was a busy mom volunteering on our playschool board, shuffling kids to and from school, packing lunches, making farm meals, keeping our home, finding childcare for our baby so I could take the older kids to soccer by myself during seeding, and taking shifts at the hospital when I could while feeling guilty I was taking precious time away from my husband who could be working on the farm. I dealt with a baby who needed surgery at 11 weeks old and then required a seven-hour round-trip drive to appointments every two weeks for 4-1/2 months. Then, like a pressure cooker that had reached full pressure, the valve of my mental health capacity released, and all the steam along with my emotions came shooting out the top in a fury after a traumatic event at work.

I got over that event from work rather quickly, as it is part of my job as a registered nurse, but it also brought to the surface so many issues I’d been keeping at bay for the previous four years of my life. My dad died in April 2013 from alcoholism-related health issues; he was only 55. A big part of any addiction is the mental health component, even more so than the overall physical health component, and I promised myself last spring that I would finally address everything that came up since his death.

One night when I felt like I was really struggling, I sent a text to my husband when he was working, that I thought it was time to go to therapy and try to sort out what I’ve been going through that had been dragging me down. I really hadn’t processed the impact my dad’s alcoholism had on me when he was alive, and, even worse, how his death impacted my family relationships and dynamic afterward. I also made an appointment with my family doctor and took him my Generalized Anxiety Disorder score from therapy and talked to him about my options for medication and further treatment. We agreed to put me on an anti-anxiety/anti-depression medication that had very few side-effects. I would check in with him frequently to see how I was coping and I agreed to keep going to therapy, as medication alone wouldn’t be the solution.

I cannot tell you how much my life has changed for the better since starting my medication last summer. Anxiety isn’t always what you might picture it to be, and mine appeared in the form of irritability, anger, and even rage. I wasn’t sleeping, I wasn’t eating properly, and it appeared as physical symptoms such as nausea and shakiness. I am a much happier and patient person, and my husband and kids deserve that of me, and I deserve that for myself. You cannot pour from an empty cup, so never feel guilty or that you aren’t worth enough to fill your cup so that you can take care of others.

If you were diagnosed with diabetes there would be no shame in taking insulin, the medication that diabetics require, and learning all there is about how to adapt your lifestyle. I see mental illness and the treatment it requires no differently. If you are suffering from depression, anxiety, or another illness — take it seriously and reach out for help. You’re not alone.

The post My name is Sarah and I have anxiety appeared first on Grainews.

This is when I started diving into very basic research and interviewing experts regarding GMOs, organic farming, pesticides, and any other controversial topic I could think of. I used my well-established platforms and reader base in the mommy blogging and parenting communities to share what I was learning, in the hopes of easing consumer fears. We already fear so many things about raising our children, so what we feed them and how that food is grown, shouldn’t be added into the worry.

Through my blog I have been fortunate enough to have many opportunities to share what I’ve learned about agriculture and what we do on our family farm. I have travelled through parts of United States as a participant in a food and farm blogging group tour which toured farms and connected with experts in the industry to have great roundtable discussions with popular food bloggers. I have been a speaker at various farming conferences and agriculture meetings throughout Western Canada about what I have done on my blog. I have tried my best to encourage people that it is essential to share their farm stories in the title of my presentation “Don’t Let the Activists Drive Your Combine.”

And now, I’m a hypocrite, not practising what I preach.

There is a whole other side of this agvocacy world, and that involves farmers on social media. The biggest backlash and criticisms about what I say, write, and do are from farmers on social media, primarily on Twitter. Somehow, a group of farmers from the Midwest in the United States was under the impression that I was “speaking for all farmers” on one of my most popular blog posts titled “How Much Glyphosate Do We Spray on Our Crops?” I was told that I was lying about how much glyphosate (Roundup) we spray on our canola on our farm in Alberta, and that it misled consumers and made the corn and soybean growers look bad, as they spray far more glyphosate on their crops than we do. I always make it explicitly clear on my blog posts that I share what we do on our farm, and that I do not speak for all farmers. I guess they didn’t get the memo, but that didn’t stop the criticisms, name-calling and bullying that ensued.

I have been threatened in a variety of ways by food activists. I have had one lady file a complaint against me to the College and Association of Registered Nurses of Alberta, as she claimed I was “selling pesticides” on my blog. The complaint was quickly dismissed and my career, and licence as an RN were safe, but someone tried to have me fired for blogging about GMOs and pesticides! I have caught the attention and been bullied by Dr. William Davis, author of the book Wheat Belly. I have received multiple threats and have been called every name under the sun in the comments section on my blog and on my Facebook page for writing about these controversial topics. I have been called a bad mother. I have even had a person write that they hoped our plane crashed on our trip to Maui a couple of years ago, simply because I share what we do on our farm.

This, I can take. However, when it’s farmers who are so cruel and make parody accounts to make fun of me and what I do on my blog? That’s where I draw the line and have actively taken a huge step back in my agvocating. I feel it is the biggest disservice that the agriculture community can do: fight publicly and criticize each other’s methods of agvocacy and farming. How do we think this reflects to consumers?

When I got pregnant with our third baby and gave birth to him, I took that opportunity to reconnect to my blogging roots in the mommy blogging world. All the hard work I’ve put into researching and writing my blog posts on agriculture still lives on my blog for all to see. The more I connect with new moms and gain new readership on my blog, the further reach I have to new audiences who may not have any other connection to agriculture. I can’t fight with farmers anymore, but I will always continue to share what we do on our farm and to share our story.

The post The other side of the ‘agvocacy’ world appeared first on Grainews.

According to many of my peers in this world of motherhood, not feeding my children organic food makes me ill suited to be a mom. I’ve actually been called a bad mother, an irresponsible mother, and downright lazy for wanting to feed my children an apple that won’t brown when you cut it — the new GMO Arctic Apple that’s been approved for sale. I didn’t realize that what I choose to feed my kids affected so many other people, in turn giving them the right to label me a “Bad Mom.” I wish these moms would recognize that we’re lucky to have the choice in what food we feed our families when so many in the world don’t have a choice.

We have all been eating these alleged “poisonous” GMOs for almost 20 years, yet within the last few years it seems a lot of people (mostly women/moms) are suddenly panicked about them. There have been a few petitions circulating that have increased the paranoia regarding GMOs and conventional agriculture. One petition calls for the removal of GMOs from baby formula and another is to stop pesticide use in conventional dairy products — a campaign started by Stonyfield, an organic yogurt company whose parent company is Danone.

To me, the latter petition is particularly absurd as its goal is to sell Stonyfield’s organic products by throwing its conventional competitors under the bus, even though it doesn’t take much Google searching to find out that organic farming uses pesticides too. This campaign strikes an unnecessary wave of fear among unknowing parents who think they are harming their children by feeding them perfectly safe and affordable conventional food.

I don’t feel guilt ridden for not buying organic food for my kids and neither should you. Here’s some food for thought: the World Health Organization (WHO), which I hold up at high standards as a registered nurse, states this about genetically modified foods:

“… no effects on human health have been shown as a result of the consumption of such foods by the general population in the countries where they have been approved.”

WHO also tells me that breastfeeding exclusively for the first six months of a baby’s life is the optimal way for feeding infants. I was able to successfully do that with my second and third children when only 10 per cent of mothers in Canada reach that goal. Yet I’m an awful mom now because I do not feed my children only organic food, right? (By the way, no one is any lesser of a mom than me for breastfeeding or bottle feeding for whatever length of time.)

Many organic food supporters abide by the “better safe than sorry” rule (the precautionary principle of motherhood), when it comes to food. I agree with that in my kids’ lives, I really do, but not when it comes to how their solid food is produced. It’s why I breastfed my babies for as long as I could and why I pay top dollar for car seats, rear face my toddlers for as long as possible, and won’t let them wear bulky winter jackets in their car seats even when it’s -30° outside. I care about my children’s health and safety immensely, but no food is ever 100 per cent safe, including organic food.

I know that I am a good mom. Some days I even call myself a great mom, and I don’t deserve to be called a bad mom for not feeding my kids organic food. So here’s my plea to you: don’t let the anti-GMO activist moms bully you into thinking that organic is the only or best way when it comes to feeding your kids. I assure you it is not. For me, it’s more important to feed my children a well-balanced diet of whole grains, fruits, vegetables, milk products and meat, than to pay outrageous prices for organic foods because of unwarranted fears of a slightly increased risk of pesticide exposure at levels the world’s best scientists say is harmless. As long as the food is safe and healthy — and that’s what the best science says about conventional foods including GMOs — then buy what you want, that’s what I say.

The post Why I don’t feed my kids organic food appeared first on Grainews.

I have used my blog, Nurse Loves Farmer, to document our lives virtually for the past several years. It is an online journal, baby book for all three of our kids, as well as my thoughts, musings and heart written out for all to see. I have written monthly updates with measurements, milestones and pictures for all of our kids until they turn two years old, so when I posted Jonathan’s two-month update, that same day I got an email from a blog reader who had never commented or introduced herself to me before.

She wrote that she had debated many times writing me this exact email but hesitated because she didn’t want to offend me. She decided it was worth the risk, and I’m forever grateful that she went out on a limb to share her concerns with me. Her concerns were over Jonathan’s head shape, which had very distinct features. These features were a protruding forehead, pinched-in temples and a bony ridge on his head. He was also starting to have a flattened area on the back right side of his head that was clearly evident in photos (I definitely noticed that myself). She said he exhibited the same skull shape as her daughter did, and she also brought up the same concerns to her doctor as I did to mine. Jonathan was born with that bony ridge on his head, as well as no soft spot on the back of his head. For the first six weeks of his life my doctor brushed it off and told me, “no it will be fine, don’t worry about it,” even though as a nurse I knew it wasn’t normal. Her doctor also brushed off the bony ridge and closed soft spot as “normal.” We were told not to worry, but we did. The motivating reason why she emailed me, was that her daughter was diagnosed with a congenital birth defect called craniosynostosis at six months old, and she needed to have an eight-hour surgery to repair her skull. Craniosynostosis is a condition where the skull bones fuse early, when normally they fuse well into adulthood. If this is diagnosed early enough, before the baby is 16 weeks old, they are often eligible for a far less invasive surgery with fewer complications and shorter operating room time and hospital stay.

And that’s exactly what happened to Jonathan.

From the day I received the email, to a consult with a neurosurgeon at the Stollery Children’s Hospital (where I used to work) in Edmonton, to his surgery, took only 20 days. It was the hardest thing in my life that I’ve ever had to do — handing over our 11-week-old baby to an operating room nurse so he could have skull surgery. They removed a piece of bone from his skull on the top where the ridge was, and cut down bone on the sides of his skull to allow room for his brain to grow. If left untreated, not only would he have a severely misshapen head, he could have developmental delay, vision problems, migraines and even seizures.

Jonathan is wearing a cranial-shaping helmet to make his skull grow in the proper shape that it needs too. It puts gentle pressure on the front and back of his head so that his head grows wide. He went through surgery and recovery like a pro and he is absolutely a rock star with his helmet, he didn’t even really have an adjustment period.

Social media can come with the hassle of dealing with internet trolls and keyboard warriors — bullies who hide behind the security of their computer screens. I’ve been a victim many, many times, but that’s all worth it now because my blog saved my baby from an invasive surgery. It’s now my mission to reach as many people as possible to spread awareness about craniosynostosis so that other babies are diagnosed early like Jonathan.

The post A reader diagnosed our baby appeared first on Grainews.

Some people, women and men alike, seem to view the term “farmwife” as (dare I go so far as to say) derogatory. I’ve come across the point argued that other wives don’t label themselves as “accountant’s wife,” “lawyer’s wife,” “plumber’s wife,” etc. You generally only see “farmwife” and “army wife” describing specific wifery genres, if you will. I agree, as brought up by a fellow farmwife when discussing this very topic, that we use the term because it’s not just our husband’s, the farmer’s, job. It’s a lifestyle that involves the whole family — dad, mom, kids and often extended family. There’s no punching in at 9 and punching out at 5; it’s a “job” that never ends.

I am very proud to be a farmwife. I can drive a tractor and operate the grain cart if need be, but for now I prefer to be somewhat of a stereotypical farmwife who stays at home with the kids and cooks and bakes for the harvest crew. I even wrote a whole blog post called “Am I a ‘Real’ Farm Wife Now?” because I’ve also come across the theory that to call yourself a farmwife means that you actually have to labour on the farm. Perhaps that’s where the problem lies: the stereotype of what many people view the farmer’s wife as. Many farmwives (of today and yesterday) are also farmers, and feel offended by the term. I personally don’t think that the term farmwife detracts from the term farmer, or now the newly coined term “farmHER,” to describe female farmers. You can make of the term whatever you want it to be and it shouldn’t take away from anyone else’s definition.

I have a generational love of farmers’ wives. My grandma, who passed away, was a registered nurse who married a farmer. Nurses marrying farmers is in our blood, and my mother-in-law is also a nurse who married a farmer. When I was a little girl I wanted to be a nurse just like my grandma; she was my hero and my role model. I didn’t have “marry a farmer” on my to-do list, of course, but when I met my husband-to-be and found out that he was a farmer, I was thrilled. I was a small-town-turned-city girl, and it never once crossed my mind in a negative way that I would have to leave life in the city to move to the farm. I kept my career as a nurse and loved working between our two rural hospitals. I made new friends and finally got to work in the emergency room (the department I’ve wanted to work in since I was a student), where I met lots of other nurses who married farmers. We all took time off during the seeding and harvest seasons to be around to help at the farm and be home for our kids.

The term “farmwife” is whatever you want it to be. I’m not offended by anyone else’s definition, so I hope that no one is offended by mine. Sure, my husband doesn’t call himself a “nurse husband,” nor do I expect him to. But for the purposes of explaining to people a big part of who I am, a simple word will do: farmwife.

The post What does ‘farmwife’ mean to me? appeared first on Grainews.

My four-year-old nephew was diagnosed with celiac disease last April. His mom noticed his belly was chronically bloated and he complained of tummy pain frequently. She had him screened for celiac disease with a blood test that showed one of his antibodies for celiac, IgG, was off the charts. He was officially diagnosed when a biopsy of his small intestine confirmed the presence of this autoimmune disorder by showing damage to the villi.

One of the most important things I’ve learned about the gluten-free diet, for those whose health truly depends on it (not fad dieters), is that the more frequently they are exposed to the gluten protein, the higher risk they are for triggering the onset of other autoimmune diseases and complications in the future. It’s not like a person with lactose intolerance who can just take some Lactaid to compensate for lactose ingestion. If a person with celiac disease is exposed to gluten, even via cross-contamination, they risk damage to their small intestine acutely, and autoimmune health issues in their future. It’s a big “oops” to make, which is why I’ve been extremely diligent about ingredient reading.

• Read more: Prairie processors plan gluten-free partnership

I go the extra mile, as should anyone preparing food for someone with celiac disease, and use separate butter so that I don’t accidentally contaminate his food with bread crumbs. I would have to deep fry anything separately for my nephew because I often fry gluten-containing products in my deep fryer. I make his french toast in a separate frying pan and have tried my hand at some gluten-free baking too. Sources for contamination are everywhere; this is something that never crossed my mind when he was first diagnosed.

Therefore, we often see oat products labelled as gluten free; they are one of the highest-risk foods to be contaminated by gluten, as they are often harvested using the same machinery as wheat, barley and rye and processed in the same plants. Oats must be certified gluten free for them to be safely consumed by people with celiac disease. To be certified, oats need to be grown in fields that haven’t grown barley, wheat or rye for at least three years. Farmers who grow certified gluten-free oats need to meticulously clean all equipment that comes into contact with the oats: the combines, grain trucks, augers, bins, etc.

Beware of hidden gluten! Believe me, I know that sounds like a sensationalist scare tactic you might find in an anti-wheat book or website, but there really is gluten in a lot of products and the source of that gluten isn’t always obvious.

• Read more: Cheerios to remove ‘gluten-free’ claim

Here are just a few of the ingredients to look out for that contain gluten: HVP/HPP (hydrolyzed vegetable/plant protein), modified food starch, malt, maltose, brown rice syrup, triticale, kamut, graham flour, brewer’s yeast, and all types of wheat, such as: durum, semolina, einkorn, spelt, faro/emmer, and bulgar.

I made sloppy joes for a harvest meal last year, and after the fact, my sister-in-law thought to ask if they had tomato soup in them. Yes, they did… why did she ask? Well, the brand of soup I always buy has wheat flour listed as the fourth ingredient — I was completely shocked. It wasn’t even a “hidden” ingredient, but I never thought to look at the ingredients on soup that wasn’t obviously containing gluten like a beef barley soup. Now I know I must be extremely paranoid, for lack of a better word, about the food I prepare for my nephew especially using sauces, marinades, soups and even broths.

Should everything not containing gluten be labelled gluten free? Absolutely not, but marketers don’t always care and want to cash in on their products. In an ideal world, it would be awesome if anything that could possibly contain gluten be labelled as gluten free, such as: soy sauce, barbecue sauce, mushroom soup, etc. Should celery, potatoes, watermelon or apples that never have and never will contain gluten be labelled as gluten free? I really don’t think so.

However, before you jump on the gluten-free-label-hating bandwagon, (I was there previously too, I admit!), just take a moment to read the ingredients to see if there really is gluten and the label is justified. The labels have made my life a lot easier learning to shop for the people with celiac in my family.

The post Changing my tune about gluten-free labelling appeared first on Grainews.

• Read more: Mental health on the farm: understanding stress

Needless to say, it was a huge wake-up call to the family on how stressful farm life can be, and that measures needed to be implemented to preserve mental health and decrease stress levels on the farm. The paternal side of my husband’s family has a strong incidence of cardiovascular disease, including high blood pressure, heart attack and stroke. It has been shown that the act of being stressed itself can change the way the body operates, which negatively affects your heart health by bringing about changes to the blood and nervous system. According to the World Heart Organization, studies have shown that acute stressful events reduce blood flow to the heart, can promote your heart to beat irregularly and increase the tendency of your blood to clot — all of which can trigger the development of cardiovascular disease. The link between stress, anxiety and the negative health effects on the body are clearly there, and I want to take steps early on in my husband’s life to make sure he’s as healthy mentally as he is physically so we can have him around as long as we can!

Most people involved in agriculture know that you practically have to drag a farmer off the farm for him or her to not be involved in the farm in some form or another as they get older. My grandfather-in-law, whom I never got to meet, was on the farm until he was no longer physically able to be there anymore. I’ve gradually seen the roles and responsibilities of planning and managing operations shift from my father-in-law to my husband and brother-in-law over the years. During this time I have also seen my husband’s stress levels rise, and he was never one to be easily stressed out.

Perhaps it’s because I’m from a non-farming background, but I have always thought and said that we cannot control the uncontrollable like the weather, so why worry and stress about it? Easier said than done! This I’ve learned too, as your livelihood and financial security are almost solely based on factors that you cannot control, but at the end of the day it is true, and is it worth risking our health over? I’ve recently talked with my farmer about my concerns about his stress levels and mental well-being. It’s the concerned wife, mother of his children, but also the registered nurse in me that perhaps cares the most. I’ve encouraged him to take the farm life day by day, even hour by hour if he has to. It’s so important to focus on the good and positive things in life and to take time away from the farm, even just a day or half a day, to enjoy life.

It is vital to have regular physicals with your family doctor to screen for potential health issues, including mental health issues and the effects of stress. Make sure, as much as you possibly can, to take steps as a farm family to decrease the stresses in your life and enjoy the farm life you’re living. I’ve seen over the years that my father-in-law has been proactive in getting away from the farm as needed and doing other non-stressful things that bring him joy. That is the main definition of farm sustainability to me: fostering a love of agriculture in our children and being around to nurture and mentor that love so that they can farm too.

The post I worry about my farmer’s stress appeared first on Grainews.

Some of the points in the article were: not only do you have to cook, but you have to shop, plan, prepare and clean up. One of the big things this harvest that is wearing me down is point No. 7 in the article, which is playing The Guessing Game. For our family alone at harvest dinners, we always have six adults and five children to feed. Since we added a third combine to the lineup this year, sometimes we will have two hired men and a sister with her three kids who also join the supper crew. This year we’ve also had random farm visitors show up at suppertime, and even Case mechanics who have joined the supper table.

• Lisa Guenther: Feeding the harvest crew
• Amy Jo Ehman: Meals in the field?

Needless to say, it can make harvest suppers tricky by playing The Guessing Game with questions such as: How many people will I be feeding today? Is the hired man who eats enough for three adults coming? Will my eight-year-old nephew eat like a bird, or enough for three adults as well? Does this have gluten in it for my other nephew who has celiac disease? Darn… what can I quickly make without gluten in it? Do we even need to eat as a harvest crew tonight? Will they be rained out? Is the grain dry enough to combine? Where will we be eating? Did they move fields? Did I pack enough utensils, plates and cups for everyone? Do I have to do dishes and clean my house in a panic to host everyone here last minute? I hope the kids like this meal. Will the kids even eat anyway, or do I have to fight with them and coax them to eat? Will we get rained out as I pull into the field for supper? Will random guests show up and I won’t have enough food? What do they mean they decided to combine and it’s 4 p.m. and I have to cook for 15 people!? What should I cook? I’m really running out of big meal ideas. Do I even care anymore?

I am trying really, really hard to adapt to the flying-by-the-seat-of-my-pants attitude when it comes to these harvest meals, but I have a very Type A personality and like to be as organized as possible. Last-minute changes really throw me for a loop and I get very anxious and feel the physical effects on my body if a wrench gets thrown into my plans. (In my defence, having a young baby during harvest is also a whole other complicated story!) I need to take lessons from my saint on earth (no sarcasm intended), amazing mother-in-law who displays grace and goes with the flow like no other. However, when I hear her say, “you had better be done this field before supper tomorrow or you won’t be eating,” when it’s her turn to cook, I know that even she has her limits!

The post Tribulations of cooking for the harvest crew appeared first on Grainews.

Baby Schultz No. 3 was due on May 7 and I knew it was going to be a whirlwind of a time with two older brothers in school, spring sports starting and, of course, seeding all the acres on the farm with a husband and father working 16-hour days. Not exactly how I would have envisioned having our last baby, but we were very happy and excited nonetheless. Our first baby was four days overdue and our second baby came exactly three weeks earlier than him… so with our third baby, it felt like a complete gamble as to when he or she was going to make their appearance.

The spring of 2016 was very dry for us where we farm in Wheatland County, so the guys were out in the fields earlier than they ever had been on April 15. I was 37 weeks pregnant, feeling like a ticking time bomb, and was thankful for every day I didn’t have the baby! In my mind, I figured it would be ideal if the guys could plug away with seeding and maybe even be done by the time this baby came! It didn’t take long for the weight (literally) of the third trimester to catch up to me and had me willing this baby out, not giving a care to what was going on in the field. I just didn’t want to be pregnant anymore and I made that evident to my husband, who jokingly told me, “You know, every day that you don’t have this baby we get five per cent closer to finishing seeding!” Not my idea of a funny joke.

Two weeks later on a Saturday afternoon, just after lunch the contractions started. I’d been having weeks of irregular contractions, so I didn’t want to get my hopes up, but I started timing them just in case. An hour went by of regular contractions and I decided to call my husband to see where he was seeding that day and to let him know that there was a possibility that we would be having to go to the hospital. We just assumed it would happen in the middle of the night like it did with our other two babies, so I was having a hard time believing these contractions could be leading up to something. I had also called my mother-in-law, child care for our two boys, to let her know not to go too far (she has a busier social life than me) because things might be happening. They were farming about 10 minutes away at my brother-in-law’s house and she was just going to deliver lunch but would be back soon.

After I called the hospital at 4 we decided it was time to go. My mother-in-law came over to watch our boys. I kissed them and told them I was going to the hospital to have the baby, and it made the most sense for me to drive our truck to meet my husband where he was farming to save time. I texted him that I was on my way and that we had one-quarter tank of gas (which was more than enough fuel to get us to the hospital 45 minutes away), and he scolded me for not having a full tank. So, I made a quick pit stop at the farm to fuel up while I was in labour and having contractions, just to be stubborn and make my husband feel bad, quite frankly!

We got to the hospital by 5 and welcomed our third baby boy into the world just after 8 p.m. We reflected that it really couldn’t have gone more perfectly to have our seeding baby — over half the land was already seeded, my husband got in a full day’s work, we went to the hospital, had a quick and uneventful delivery and he got to go home in time for bed and get up and go back to work the next day.

So there you have it. That’s how to have the perfect seeding baby!

The post How to have the perfect seeding baby appeared first on Grainews.