The final product. "The sheep shed"

Well, after many hours of hard work and organization, the new shelter is complete. We are all very confident that the sheep will enjoy their much needed new sleeping quarters. =)
One final inspection from our chief inspector (Stella Dorothy) and we are good to go!


It was a pleasure to work with such a grateful and dedicated group of students and staff at Orange High School. I hope that the community can see the value that this program provides for our leaders of tomorrow.

a special THANK YOU to:
The Home Depot, and its many employees who helped to get us as much material as possible.
Christian Building Materials
Nelson Frappier
Alberto Gomez 

Who knows... we may be back to help some more in the spring.. stay tuned!!

The OLD

The NEW

The strength of many hands

This week we have enlisted the help of all of the farm students. With 20 sheets of plywood to primer, THEN PAINT, BOTH SIDES, it would have taken Alberto and I three days to do each step ourselves. With the help of about 10-12 students, over the course of 3 days, we had all of the wood primer’ed, painted, and we started to put the roof on “el casa de sheep-n-goats.”

The roof is coming along great this week. Alberto has done a fine job with the shingles, rafters, and all of the joist hardware.

The animals have grown curious over this new formation taking shape in their pasture. At the end of each day, the students or Mrs. Williams let them roam around and sniff out their updated abode.

On 1/12, another one of the sheep gave birth to a single cute black and white lamb. Super cute!

A couple more days and the sheep, and their newborns will be moving in to their new upgraded spacious condominium.

Frank Frappier- 1/14/11

Foundation is set, Posts are in, Picnic on the Farm

Inspector Stella on the job!

Alberto, Brian, and Nelson working on the plan.

Construction starts  early.. that’s what I remember from my younger days on my dad's job sites. This was no exception. 7am we were at Home Depot in Orange to pick up the rented Auger(yes that is Auger). This is a large drill made to drill large holes in the dirt, where you pour concrete to “cement” the 4x4 posts on a building.

Over to the High School and of course the students were there already.. (on a Saturday at 7 am). Why wouldn’t they be? (sarcasm inserted here)

-12 holes dug,

-15 bags of concrete mixed

-12 4 x 4’s  put in the ground.

(it really took all day, but we’ll spare you the boring construction details. =)

The fun part though, was that we had goats and sheep inspecting our work along the way. Since we were in the pasture, we had “visitors” every so often to see how we were doing.

The sheep were looking for a way to help. 

In fact, one of the sheep delivered Twins last night and we were able to see the newborn lambs in the pen win their mother… really cool!

My wife Leah came by with our Daughter Stella Dorothy, and we had a nice picnic on the farm, and introduced Stella D. to a bunch of the animals. That was my favorite part of the project so far!  My wife is in love with Curly, the Scottish steer.

Curley. 

Frank Frappier- 1/8/11

Dad’s persistence pays off

Well, after about four weeks, 8 letters, and 16 trips to local stores by my dad (Nelson Frappier), the bulk of the necessary building supplies have been acquired and we are ready to start building.

It turns out that Lumber, and Plywood is “not so cheap”.  Three different Home Depot’s gave about $250 each in building materials, and Christian Building Materials, gave us $600 worth of roofing supplies.

Today we started bringing all of the supplies over to the school and meeting the Farmhands who would be helping us with some of the labor.

These students, LET ME TELL YOU,  are dedicated to their animals!! They are constantly there at the farm. Feeding, washing, prepping, exercising etc… it is A LOT of work to raise animals properly. Each of these students are assigned an animal at the beginning of the year, and it is their responsibility (and privilege) to raise the animals in a proper environment, up until they bring them to the county fair in July. At this time the animals are sold off to the highest bidder which teaches the students even more about the process of raising, marketing, and selling of livestock. 

The kids even name their prized animals. One of the pigs name is “piggy smalls”. They have an adorable Scottish steer who’s name is curly.

This responsibility does not come cheap. Each of these students is responsible for raising their own funds necessary in order to :house, feed, and maintain their respective animal all the way from animal assignment, up until the sale at the county fair.  For example, a steer would cost approximately $3000 to the student if they wanted to raise a steer through the year and sell it at the fair. Alternatively, a sheep would cost approximately $600  to maintain until the fair. Again, more lessons for the students about responsibility and finances involved. It is no wonder that they are THERE ALL THE TIME!

Back to the project…. Now we have the materials. It’s time to get dirty and start building!

Frank Frappier 1/5/11

Orange High School – Shelter for pregnant sheep

I started my search for volunteer opportunities. In deciding where to start, I remembered that when I was five years old, my Dad took me to Orange High School to get a “half steer” from their agriculture dept for a HUGE picnic that we were putting on in the summer.

So I called the school today, and it turns out that OHS is not only the place where my wife AND mother in law graduated high school, but also, they still in fact are the best-reputed Agriculture department in Orange County! This is only 3 miles from my home in Tustin. AWESOME!!

I set up a meeting with Mrs. Patti Williams, who is the head of the Ag dept. She shared with me that the school has been through tremendous cutbacks, and that they would welcome any contribution, which we felt qualified to help with.

In asking about her needs, she explained to me that they have four pregnant sheep, and with cold and wet winter months looming, they are in dire need of a new shelter to be built for these sheep, as well as many other animals, including goats, geese, yak, alpaca etc…

With my Father as a licensed General Contractor, and 30 years of experience in building, this was a no brainer! We can use our contacts in the community to help raise donations, and my Dad, myself and OHS students will supply the labor.

The plan is set:

My Dad has estimated that the materials will cost about $1300 in total to build this shelter (24 feet X 8 feet deep X 7 feet high)

The next couple of weeks will be spent going around to our local businesses to raise donations, and materials for this project. Home Depot, Ganahl Lumber, and Christian Building Materials will be our first targets.

The old shelter for the sheep... Pretty sad! 

Frank Frappier- 12/8/10

Frank Frappier, Discovering Agriculture through volunteer opportunities

In my ten years in business for myself I have been fortunate to develop many lifelong relationships with friends and associates. I have also had the opportunity to travel to many states, and countries and experience many beautiful environments.

Above ALL PLACES that i have had the opportunity to travel to, one single place which has caught a hold of my interest repeatedly over the past five years, is a private ranch owned by the family of a dear friend of mine.

Sunrise on the ranch.

The old barn

 I have been extremely fortunate to have been taken on so many “ranch rides”, (and later hunting excursions) which captivated me like no place else on earth.

More ranch pics

"The look back" main canyon

Deer catching shade under the oak

Part of this experience each time, is my up close encounters with the business of raising cattle. (The ranch has a continuous 150 cow/calf on it year round. I have on many occasions seen calfs which were born just hours or days prior.) 


Five years ago, I could not tell you the first thing about cows, calfs, cattle, steer, heifers or bulls. After three or four “rides”, and seeing many “just born” calf’s learning to walk with their shaky legs, my questions to my dear friend started to mount. Being a businessman, I had lots of questions: What time of year do they give birth? What happens to the calfs? Do they sell both male, and female offspring? Who buys them? What do they do with them? Do the cows/calfs need medical maintaining? What does it cost to feed them? Do the dams on the ranch go dry? What happens when there Is not enough rainfall at the ranch?......And so on, and so fourth…. My buddy…thank God he grew up on the ranch and loves talking about it.  I mean, sometimes I felt sorry that I was asking so many questions, but this place was just captivating to me!!

Wheres the beef harry? oh wait... 

My buddy Doug

During the times that I spent at the ranch over the past five years, I can remember thinking to myself how incredibly sad it is that the youth of America in today’s age are so tied up with Twitter, Facebook and video games that they will likely NEVER get to experience the education that I was receiving first hand.

Even in families who “wish” to expose their kids to the value of where there nutrition comes from, they are often “too busy” and focused on making as much MONEY as possible, that these simple, but deep lessons are never in fact exposed.

In our Orange County California school system, things are quite similar. With budget cuts and more emphasis being put in to “test scores” (Math, English,etc..) the agriculture teaching departments are continually being cut back.


I have a personal desire to accomplish two things. 


#1- give back to my community and help support our local agriculture teaching facilities in southern California. 


#2- continue my own education about agriculture, and get involved with people who can teach me more about the subjects of livestock and the business of it all... 


I will do this by volunteering, and giving my time, as well as leveraging relationships that I have, in order to contribute to the community.

Please stay tuned to follow me on my mission!

Frank Frappier-   12/01/10

About Me

As a student at Tustin High School, Frank Frappier participated in an array of extracurricular activities. In addition to captaining three sports teams, he earned recognition as an Eagle Scout in 1998. After graduating from Tustin, Frank Frappier enrolled at Vanguard University of Southern California. Possessing an in-depth knowledge of athletics, he started at IntenseCity Sports Performance as a Sales Representative but quickly advanced to Director of Sales. In this capacity, Frank Frappier hired, trained, and supervised personnel while collaborating with the Performance Director. He also organized marketing campaigns and represented the company at a host of events. In 1999, Frank Frappier left the training institute and began with Fax.com as a Sales Representative. He briefly played in the European Baseball Club in 1999 as well. At Vanguard University of Southern California, Frank Frappier majored in business administration with a concentration on organizational management. He graduated in 2002 and continued his successful career with Fax.com, generating 40 percent of the company’s annual sales for four straight years. Still with Fax.com in 2003, Frank Frappier launched Family Choice Healthcare in Irvine, California. The company expanded exponentially, and Frank Frappier left Fax.com in December 2004 to focus his full attention on his new enterprise. Frank Frappier oversaw the development of six offices across California and Nevada and successfully brought affordable healthcare to thousands of households. In 2007, Frank Frappier utilized his knowledge and experience in sales to begin a national advertising agency headquartered in Costa Mesa, California. His new business, Nationwide Media, is now in its third year and currently employs 20 people with diverse backgrounds and qualifications. Giving back to the organization he belonged to in his youth, Frank Frappier now volunteers as an Assistant Scout Master with the Boys Scouts of America. When he is not working, he enjoys international travel and photography.