As most of you know, this past August I was fortunate enough to attend the AgChat Foundation inaugural social media conference in Chicago with the sponsorship of Dairy Farmers of America and Dairy Management Incorporated. This conference was held with the purpose in helping 50-80 farmers, nationwide learn skills on how to better utilize social media {aka Facebook, Twitter and blogging} to tell our farm stories.
This past weekend I was asked by Dairy Farmers of America, who is also our cooperative for the dairy, to sit in on a panel along with Barbara Martin, aka Dairy Goddess, to share with California DFA Young Cooperators how and why we began our blogging journeys. This DFA, two day classroom session was part of the Cal Poly Dairy Symposium and Cal Poly Classic Sale in San Luis Obispo - DFA was one of the sponsors for this dairy event.
We began our four hour drive down to San Luis Obispo on Thursday afternoon, with farmers still hard at work along the way. I thought these photos turned out pretty good while driving at 70 mph. {Dominic was driving}.
So Barbara's and my presentation was held in one of the meeting rooms at Embassy Suites on Friday morning. Around 35 or so people attended. Here's Barbara telling her story....
Bryce and Paige tagged along also. They did very well as they sat in on the a.m. part of the meeting.
As I mentioned in Thursday's post, I felt a little nervous about speaking in front of group.....this is more Dominic's expertise....I just take photos, blog about things and converse with people online. I was really anticipating feeling a lot like this guy....
But, I actually kind of liked it! Who knew? And I didn't throw up or pass out from holding my breath like I thought I might do....phew!
A great, new experience for me. I love sharing blogging information with these young dairy farmers. And one of the bonuses to this meeting was being able to meet Barbara in person. We follow each other online and feel like we know each other pretty well, but have never met in person. It's always great to make that in-person connection. And the Dairy Goddess is a ton of fun to party with, but more on that later.
Monica, from DFA was another super sweet person that I was able to meet her in person as well. Monica had to leave Friday afternoon to fly back home so we only had a little time to chat, but I'm sure we'll meet again in the future sometime and I look forward to it :)
Update: my Blogger photo uploader is back on track....finally!
Happy Saturday!
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3 comments:
I enjoyed reading your post. You and Barbara do a great job for the dairy industry. Continue your wonderful work!
Isn't SLO wonderful? Would love to know more about the grass fed dairies that I've seen along the NorCal highways. I live in the central San Joaquin Valley, and it seems, at least on the surface, that these conventional dairies don't seem as appealing or healthy to the animals or to the consumer. I'm not an animal rights activist, but it seems that grass fed cows would produce a better product.
Gypsy Chick, thanks for visiting and asking questions. It is beneficial for dairy farmers both conventional & organic to maintain a healthy and comfortable herd. An uncomfortable, unhealthy cow will not produce very well. We all strive to keep our herds as happy as possible. You can read more in-detail information in my post Organic vs. Conventional Dairy Farms at this link: http://www.thewifeofadairyman.blogspot.com/2010/06/organic-vs-conventional-dairy.html {or under the heading 'Cow Talk' look up 'Organic vs. Conventional'
I appreciate you wanting to learn more about the care of our cows and if you have any other questions, please let me know:) ~Nancy
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