After many years as a competitive curler, including a two-time Olympic gold medallist, Kaitlyn Lawes is taking a step back to spend more time with her husband and two young daughters on their Manitoba farm.
Lawes was a guest speaker of a ZOOM event last Thursday hosted by the Canadian Agricultural Safety Association, as part of Kids FarmSafe Week from May 11-17.
Lawes grew up in Winnipeg, but spent many summers as a girl visiting her grandparents farm in Ontario. She made the shift to rural life by moving to her husband's farm in the fall of 2024.
"We're on a grain farm, we don't have animals, and so just being aware of all of the things that are around the farm, the tools, the equipment, the bins, the augers, and things that I wasn't familiar with as like growing up in the city. So just the visually obvious things I think were the ones that I recognized right away." she said.
She says growing up on a farm is a good opportunity for her daughters, who are three-and-a-half and one-and-a-half years of age.
"They're at an age where they're always going to be supervised. If it's not me, someone's always going to be with them when we're outdoors exploring and it's fun for me to see what they are wanting to explore and what are certain things that I can help make them aware of like their surroundings," She said.
"I ask them a lot of questions as we play outside and I try and encourage them to ask me questions and if I don't have the answer then I try and find the answer for them right away."
Lawes says it was a challenge juggling her curling career with life on the farm.
"Being in the city, I was probably 15 to 20 minutes away from many different curling facilities or gyms. Now I believe I was putting in about 16 hours a week just driving to get to practice. So that more than quadrupled, I'd say, my driving time and just logistically had to be a lot more organized and planning things out for child care, making sure that I had all that set up before I could get to the rink."
Lawes says its very important to have good communication with your partner on the farm — not that much different than on a curling team.
"Me to know what he needs from me in the farm world so I can try and be supportive whether it's helping get things ready in the morning when it comes to he's getting out into the field or talking about even just bringing meals to the field so he can continue on seeding right now, for example, it might seem small but it's something that can allow him to have more time in the field and not have to be going into the wee hours of the morning or late at night."
While Lawes is not completely writing off a return to competitive curling in the near future, she says her focus for the time being is on learning about how to farm safely with her family.
(With files from Neil Billinger, CJWW)
