Category Archives: Events

A program dear to the hearts of those that visit the farm is the horse program. They have been at the farm since the beginning.

Horses have been documented to be a healing component in everyone’s life….It has been shown in studies that horses and their care has proven to be a healing factor in the lives of many children and adults. The Freedom Farm For Vets chooses to use equine assisted therapy for the management of stress, where time with horses helps vets become comfortable with feeding and grooming and builds trust that they can transfer to their lives and families.

Veterans have been known to visit the farm with no experience with horses, many afraid to get too close. With gradual exposure to the horses and, with guidance from the farm management, they are excited to return to help with grooming and feeding, as they have created a bond with the horses and a sense of peacefulness in the environment.

Horses have an intuition, a sense of what people are feeling, sensing issues trust or anxiety people may be having. In one instance, “Little Girl” worked slowly with a veteran to earn trust that she would not hurt them. After a time, when the trust from the veteran was increased, they relaxed and spent time together in grooming and meeting at the pasture fence. Horses have been know to go up to people and stand, waiting for a response from the person. It is amazing to watch.

Please support the farm in this special program. The work that the horses and the veterans do together is of great importance to the well being of the veterans. Helping support the horses supports the veteran.

One of the longest running programs at the Freedom Farm for Vets has been the Rose Program. The program started as a gift to the veterans as patients in the James A Lovell Federal Health Care Center. Realizing that so many come from other cities and towns in the area, many have no visitors, and often they have no families. The Freedom farm decorates plastic bottles and takes a rose to each patient, in the hospital proper, and to those veterans in the assisted living and long term nursing care facility. The patients in the hospital are often surprised by the visit and the rose and the long term residents look forward to the return visits each week. Several times, children have been among the volunteers delivering the roses and they bring extra joy to the days of those in the hospital. The nursing staff is always included with a bouquet of roses at their stations, because without them, the care of our veterans would not be what it is for them today.

During the Christmas season, the roses are replaced with poinsettias and styrofoam Christmas ornaments, cut out and decorated by the veterans and some of the children that visit the farm. These are especially appreciated for the few that remain in the hospital during the holiday season.

Thank you to all our veterans for your service. We hope that the small token we continue to bring brighten your days in recovery.

Thank you to our many volunteers over the years for their hard work and support, and to the many people donating the roses to the farm in memory or honor of their loved ones.

We want to send a big thank you out to Larsen’s Florist, of Waukegan. They have donated over 35,000 roses over the years and the bedding plants for the gardens. At Christmas, they donate the poinsettias that are delivered to the Medical Center for veterans. They have been an amazing support for the program and we are extremely grateful.

Christmas ornaments at the nurses station

Tending the roses at the farm