Storyhill Farm

05/28/2026

This is the first story I've been blessed to be apart of publishing! My mom is such a great storyteller! I was so honored to do the illustrations based on my grandpa's black and white photos. Imagine, Little House in the 1960s. It is the story of my mom growing up in Sidney, Ohio - a sweet, feel-good look at childhood.

Childhood comes once, and everybody gets their own time and place for growing up. Nine-year-old Janie loves growing up on Bon Air Drive with her parents and two younger sisters. Each season provides its own share of interesting activities. Whether she is struggling to improve her arithmetic or ex...

05/20/2026

https://www.farmanddairy.com/news/wool-pool-back-on-in-western-pennsylvania/914975.html?fbclid=IwdGRjcAR6vGxjbGNrBHq8BWV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHsvcQAy6NxUSDEbdWTaIBvrvLGeuHJPfw3obzm3JRNGHPeWbkfqXyIhY98KI_aem_8CAnfwTJs6HxFCdKqgFFXA

For anyone local(ish) with sheep - please consider selling your wool here. It is important that we get the wheels of commerce turning for wool products. This is a great way to support the cause. Come hang out with other shepherds, learn about the process, get paid, and enjoy delicious food from our food trucks!

The Western Pennsylvania Cooperative Sheep and Wool Growers Association will host its Wool Pool again after a five year break when its wool had no market.

05/10/2026

Happy Mother's Day!! 🌿❤️🌱⚘️🌿🪻🌱🌷🌿🌸🌱💐🌿🌹🌱🪻

Here is a helpful hint to spruce up your grocery store bunch of flowers . . . In Pennsylvania, we have wild chervil (a class A noxious w**d) and dame's rocket (class B noxious w**d) blooming. Both push out native plants, but are truly beautiful cut flowers. Stop and pick some (in a safe place that you are allowed) to make nice filler flowers in a Mother's Day bouquet. Wild chervil looks like Queen Anne's Lace and also gets confused for poison hemlock that blooms in a few more weeks. Be sure it has ribbed slightly hairy stems and no purple splotches. Dame's rocket has 4 petals and comes in shades of purple to white. The native phlox has 5 petals.

Pick 'em to beat 'em! Be apart of the war on invasives and make your mom happy in the process! May you have a blessed day with family and the special women in your life!

05/10/2026

The hay is growing. The Lord is faithful to provide.

04/25/2026

Rub a dub dub. Three lambs in a tub and who do you think they be? The sick one, the orphan, and the too-little-milk one. Turn them out knaves, all three.

This is my current box of misfits. As I near the end of lambing season, I see getting sleep on the horizon, but I'm still getting only about 4 hours at a time. Thankfully lambs develop quickly and this box of needy ones will be able to go about 6 hours between feedings next week and graduate to the outdoor pen.

04/19/2026

My bed time this morning. . . I have totally lost track of how many lambs were born today. We just kept ushering newborns and their mothers into the bonding pens. Tonight, I have a new bottle baby lamb in the kitchen which means I will be back up at 7am to feed the new little one. Farming can appear idyllic; we love this life, but it can be exhausting during certain seasons.

04/16/2026

Romans 8:28: "And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose".

Did you know sheep are born with long tails?

The barn is full! I need to dock and tag the 28 lambs born in the last two days. I hate docking tails. It is painful for them for about an hour. I put a strong rubber band around the tail to cut off blood flow and the tail falls off in about a week. It seems cruel, but sheep don't use toilet paper and they have been bred for thousands of years to have long wool. That wool on the tail collects moisture and all the droppings from the backend. There are flys that lay their eggs on wet wool and the maggots begin eating the flesh. After a few days if not caught, enough ammonium from the maggots poisons the animal and they die. So as shepherds, we dock tails.

Show sheep get their tails docked really short so they look good in the show ring. In England, they do a long dock to cover the bits. There are muscles in the tail that help in going to the bathroom and birthing. A really short dock can lead to prolapse. I personally do a dock in the middle and actually breed for lambs that can lift their tail with better control. I bet you never new there was so much to tails. Lol!

I can't have a conversation with these little lambs to explain this all to them. They will just know me as the one who caused pain. I really have their good at heart, but they don't know it. It will take weeks before they trust me again and view me as the vending machine who gives good food.

I imagine the Lord doing the same for me at times. I don't understand the pain that he allows, but I trust that he has my good at heart.

04/14/2026

"For behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land." Song of Solomon 2:11-12

There had been a time 10 years ago, that I debated about getting rid of the geese on our farm, but then I realized I would miss their antics like this. Tis the season of proud processionals of successful parents, of hissing and honks. Scattered across the farm are geese on their nests and their ganders orbiting to guard their mate. The first gosling has hatched and the pride and protection of the birds are comical and endearing as they march their baby through the barnyard for the first time. We have Pilgram Geese which is a rare auto-sexing breed. As far as geese go, they are calm and easy to tell male and female. The males are white and the females are the grey/brown. I can tell this gosling is a female because of her grey beak. The babies all have a very distinct song so that we often know there is a new hatchling before we even see them.

After a cold Winter of snow, it is beautiful to hear new life. God is good!

04/13/2026

Weeping may endure for the night, but the joy comes in the morning Psalm 30:5

On the farm, we try to soak up these beautiful moments . . . Here is a first time mom raising twins beside the bluebells starting to bloom. My soul cherishes times like this. They balance the hard times. Last night, we had one of the pregnancy toxemia ewes die - raging infection with dead lambs inside of her and not dilating. This morning, the sweet, healthy twins and ewe are a blessing!

04/13/2026

I can gauge how well my day is going based on how many doses of medicine I have to give . . . This was just the start of what I had to draw up for animals today . . . So not great.

We are having a challenging lambing season. Five months ago, my ram must have been sick for a few weeks and "shooting blanks." This means we had some busy weeks in March with lots of lambs, and then we have gone quite a few weeks with no lambs. A month ago, I scheduled to have my gall bladder out this week - thinking that I would already be done with lambing. Not being able to lift due to the recovery has meant that the whole family is having to carry more. We are in full swing again, but having two ewes struggling with pregnancy toxemia (gestational diabetes). It takes the wisdom of Solomon to make quick decisions on lambs and troubleshoot problems. I'm so grateful for my amazing farm vet who came out yesterday to help with a difficult delivery!

With lots of births come some deaths. I also just lost a lamb due to a heart defect. The mother must not have been eating the minerals that we put out which caused cardic white muscle disease. It is such a helpless feeling to watch a day old lamb struggle for life.