Desperately Seeking Goat Milk

I love earrings. Unfortunately, earrings don’t love me.

For the entire decade-plus I had pierced ears, I struggled to find any earring that would not make my ears become so infected they oozed.

Nothing worked. Nickel-free, pure gold, allergy friendly…didn’t matter if the earrings were expensive or cheap. They all infected my ears.

So I let my piercings close up. Clip on earrings weren’t as uniformly ugly as they had been, so I decided to just wear clip on earrings for the rest of my life.

You know what? Clip on earrings PINCH.

HARD.

I could never wear a pair for longer than a couple hours before I wimped out and took them off.

Then I discovered Napier. Their earrings had screw-back clip ons that could be screwed tighter or looser as the day wore on, and I could wear them all day with no complaints.

For a girl who loves earrings but couldn’t wear any before, this was awesome!

You know the punchline, right? Napier earrings were hard to find. Living in Houston and frequently in New York on business, I searched every store I could find for Napier screw-back clip on earrings and often came up empty.

When I did stumble on a store that carried them, I bought every pair I even remotely liked (sometimes duplicate pairs), as I knew this was a rare find.

All these years, I thought my hunt for earrings was a massive feat of searching…but that search can’t even begin  to hold a candle to the search we are on right now!

Goat milk.

We’re desperate.

Our goat milk experience hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing from the beginning.

Our first goat milk lady was almost a two hour drive one way away from us, and we barely got enough milk to last between our biweekly visits.

Then she dried up her goats early for personal reasons, and we scrambled to find a new goat milk supplier.

Fortunately, we found two new providers!

One has Nigerian Dwarf goats, and we get 5 quarts of milk from her every two weeks.

The other lives just down the road from us, and we get 2 gallons a week from her.

We love her! She is so sweet and her kids and mine get along famously. It’s a match made in goat milk heaven.

When our first goat milk lady stopped selling, that was the first I’d heard that goat milk isn’t typically provided year round. Immediately, I instituted a “freeze and stash” plan for our new supplies of goat milk. Every chance I got, I froze half gallons of milk to help get us through the winter months.

About a month ago, our larger supplier of milk had a scare: one of her goats had a seizure and nearly died.

Since she wasn’t sure, at the time, whether it was an infection or a vitamin deficiency, she told me to stop drinking her milk and that she wouldn’t sell any more milk until test results came back.

For a couple weeks, we were using our stash.

Eventually her goats got a clean bill of health, and we began buying from her again.

But our stash took a bit of a hit during that time. 

I just got word from her that her last sell date is December 6th. Only 4 more weeks of milk coming from our biggest provider of milk!

She won’t resume sales until mid-April, at the earliest. 

That’s a long time to go without goat milk when you’re wholly dependent on it.

Fortunately, our other goat milk lady had a goat that kidded late in the year; we’ll be able to continue getting some  goat milk from her through at least February.

Still, even if we maintain the 5 quarts every two week we’re currently at, that won’t be enough.

We did some math.

Based on the current supply of goat milk stashed in my freezer, plus the gallons I’ll be able to buy between now and Dec. 6th, plus the milk I’ll continue to get from our other goat milk lady, the numbers indicate we can allow the boys to have 2.5 cups of goat milk per day between now and the April resumption of sales.

2.5 cups per day. 

For two boys.

Two boys who can drink a half gallon of milk some days. 

Y’all, this isn’t going to work!

I’ve left a message with someone we just found who sells goat milk, but I haven’t heard back from them yet.

My mom is calling everyone she knows to see if they have any leads.

Now I’m putting it out here and on Facebook: anyone know of any goat milk providers who can sell me some milk – ANY quantity! – in Northwest Arkansas? At this point, I’m okay with Southern Missouri, Central Arkansas, and even Eastern Oklahoma!

We must get goat milk. I’m mad at myself for not knowing earlier that goats are typically dried up. I’m mad at myself that I didn’t realize how long we would have to go between when the goats are dried up and when they begin milking again. I’m mad at myself that I didn’t stockpile more milk this summer.

But being mad at myself doesn’t solve the immediate problem: without goat milk, I can’t go to work. 

Without me working, we will go bankrupt. 

I’m not kidding when I say this is vital. 

If we can’t find enough goat milk, we will be forced to do a cow milk trial, which I’m really scared to do. But Zac has to have SOMETHING for when I’m at work!

The good news is that those earring searches prove I am nothing if not persistent. No stone will be left unturned.

Anybody have any stones out there I can search under? Please? 

Thanks for your help! Leave a comment or email me if you’ve got any leads. I really appreciate it!

And yes, I’ve learned my lesson. Next year I’ll buy twice as much goat milk as we use to stash away. We just need to survive until then.