00:00Hi Katie, I'm Carly Fortune, the Executive Editor at Refinery29 Canada.
00:04I am at home with my three and a half year old and I am so glad to be talking
00:09to another mom today.
00:11Thanks for joining me.
00:16You are a mom of four and a dairy farmer and a photographer.
00:21How have you been doing?
00:25I get asked that a lot and it's like when I had four kids,
00:28I didn't really expect a global pandemic to be part of raising my children.
00:33It's very uncharted waters.
00:35I mean, the farm thing and the photography thing I can handle and then the kids I can always handle,
00:40but it's when you throw something of this magnitude into the mix.
00:44And as a mom, I think you feel like you always have to be everything anyway,
00:47but I think in this situation, you really had to become everything, like teacher, coach, chef.
00:53Certain anxieties and things coming out that it's just, it's really hard.
00:56It's really hard.
00:57Are there any routines or things that you've been doing that have helped in trying to overcome some of these
01:05struggles?
01:06I mean, the farm generally has a routine.
01:09There's like a rhythm to farm life.
01:11It doesn't change day to day.
01:12So we've kept that.
01:14Obviously, we have morning chores and then breakfast.
01:16I do find routine helps and I do find my kids are craving routine.
01:20And they're asking me to go back to school.
01:22So we've reached that point.
01:24Katie, you mentioned earlier that one of the roles you've taken on is that of chef.
01:30And I imagine with four children, that is particularly time consuming and challenging.
01:35What's your strategy?
01:37We actually decided to make butter while we were home.
01:41We obviously have lots of milk around.
01:42So that was a fun little science experiment for the kids.
01:46Cheese slices are just like a go-to for our family.
01:49We never have enough cheese.
01:51Now we're going into summer.
01:52We're going to try some ice cream.
01:53My kids may or may not have had ice cream for breakfast this morning.
01:57My son had two bowls of yogurt this morning.
02:00It's just, yeah, I mean, I'll try and get some veggies into them at lunch.
02:04We'll roll with it.
02:06All right, Katie, we're going to change direction a little bit.
02:09And I'm going to ask you a series of rapid fire questions.
02:12For me, that I'll share with you because you're a dairy farmer is,
02:16I didn't know before the pandemic that you could freeze milk.
02:19Oh, yeah.
02:20So that was like the hack that I picked up.
02:23So I want to know from you, what is like your best parenting hack?
02:26Anytime they're just fighting, I just take them outside and turn the sprinkler on
02:30and it's immediately like, it's immediately diffused the situation for the most part.
02:35That is a great hack.
02:37Adding water is an amazing hack.
02:39That's really good.
02:40What about a recent parenting win?
02:43Watching my daughter gain some independence in the kitchen.
02:46She's mastering, you know, eggs, grilled cheese, macaroni and cheese.
02:51And she's, yeah, so that's been a big win.
02:54One last meal.
02:56Okay, next question.
02:57What summer activity are you looking forward to?
03:00We have so much beautiful space and land that we take for granted.
03:03And the animals get outside, get active, but to learn from as well.
03:07And I think that's really important that my kids know where food comes from.
03:11And I know just because we live here, I don't know if they necessarily know
03:14the science behind how milk is made or like, and what it's used for and how, you know,
03:19people use it and they're all, you know, off the farm.
03:22There's other people that buy it.
03:23Just like connecting the whole process and how that all happens.
03:28So using those opportunities and then just, just surviving the summer.
03:34What about a piece of advice you'd offer other moms right now?
03:39Don't put too much pressure on yourself.
03:41Like this is real life, but it's not anything any of us have navigated before.
03:45It's nothing our parents have navigated before.
03:47I think as moms, we always hold ourselves to a high standard.
03:52And, um, I've had to just say, just being present is enough.
03:57Like if you can get rid of all the noise in the background and just be present for like,
04:02even if it's just an hour, um, that's enough for a day.
04:07Katie, thank you so much.
04:09This is wonderful.
04:10Well, thank you so much for having an adult conversation with me.
04:14This is, this is really fun.
04:15It's so refreshing to talk to other moms particularly right now.
04:20Yeah, it really is.
04:22Well, thank you so much for your time.
04:23Oh, yeah.
04:24Thank you so much for this opportunity.
04:26I really enjoyed it.
