Our Cattle Farm
Little Bit Farm
We are Mike and Rachel McBurnett. We live in Chattahoochee Hills on a cattle farm. We are about 30 miles South of Atlanta. Our home is an old farmhouse, built in the early 1900's on our 200 acre farm. Most of our cattle are black Angus and Angus mix. Our bull is full blooded Angus. We select only the best quality cattle to process. Farming has been part of our lives for many years. We care for our cattle daily. Our cattle are free to roam and graze the open pastures with rolling hills. They have creeks, shade trees and a lake to cool themselves on hot summer days. On cold winter days they can enjoy fresh hay we bailed from our own hay fields. When we do feed, we select only high quality natural grains and minerals.
Our children and their spouses enjoy giving helping hands on the farm. They are right there ready to help when hay is ready to bail, cows need to be worked and pastures need to be bush hogged. Our grandchildren are always delighted to help when a calf needs to be bottle fed. We do our best to have healthy cows, which means happy cows, which means delicious Beef.
Over the years Mike and I have found it hard to find good quality beef. We have been blessed with this opportunity to provide fresh high quality beef for our customers. We look forward to meeting you, and helping you select the best cuts for you and your family to enjoy.
If you would like to know how we came to have this farm and why it is our Little Bit Farm read below.
Our Story
I am Rachel McBurnett and I live at 7805 Jones Ferry Road. Let me tell you how God was working in my life so many years before I was even born.
In 1946 my Aunt Travis was in 2nd grade. Her teacher was Mrs. Mary Gullatt. This teacher went to Ben Hill First Baptist Church. This is also the church my Grandma, Pawpaw, and Momma attended. They became friends. As time went on the 2nd grader grew up as did her siblings. Travis’ brother Gene went into the army. He was sent to Japan. While in Japan when he would have furloughs, he would stay with a missionary host family. That family was his sister’s 2nd grade teacher and her husband, Tom Gullatt. My Uncle Gene stayed with the Gullatts many times. They discovered the history the families had. When Uncle Gene returned home they kept in touch. The Gullatts stayed in Japan and continued to serve as missionaries for 30 years or so.
Momma and her siblings were raised in Ben Hill, Ga. Tom Gullatt was raised on the farm in Palmetto, Ga (Chattahoochee Hills). A good 20 miles apart. God had put Mary in Travis’ life and then Tom and Mary in Gene’s life on the other side of the world. Coincidence? I don't think so. God's Plan!
February 23, 1963 Travis’ sister Evelyn gave birth to Rachel. That's me. I was raised in East Point, Ga. When I was seven years old my Uncle Gene was burned in a house fire. He was in the Grady Burn Unit with burns on 90% of his body. Tom and Mary Gullatt got word about Uncle Gene. They sent cards and letters saying they were praying for him and his family. After about six weeks my uncle died.
As a seven year old I did not know how God was already preparing my life. When I was sixteen I met Mike McBurnett. We dated for a short time, three months, before we got engaged. We were engaged for two years until I graduated high school. Mike called me his Little Bit. Little did I know that nickname would stay with me for over 40 years. We moved from East Point to North Coweta County in 1986. We were looking for better schools for our two children. I did not want to move so far away from my family, however Coweta County was where God wanted us. I was lonely and afraid. I didn't know anyone there and I was home all day with our two little girls. So we visited the little church at the other end of our road, Sardis Baptist Church. It was a lot like the church I grew up in. One of the first few times we visited Sardis they announced a missionary from Japan was coming home for a visit and would be doing the service about his ministry in Japan. They said his name was Tom Gullatt. I told Momma about this missionary. Momma told me about how Tom and Mary Gullatt had been involved in my family's lives throughout the years. Soon after that I got to know Tom and Mary and told them who I was and how they had prayed for my Uncle Gene and our family. We had two more children and continued to go to Sardis Church and became very fond of the Gullatts.
In 2000 we found ourselves with a problem, we had two horses and could no longer keep them on the land they had been on. A man we knew from church told us about a man he knew that may let us put our horses in his pasture until we could find a permanent place. So we met James Gullatt, Tom’s nephew. Once again my family and the Gullatt family are connected. James was delighted to have the horses in his pasture. This was only supposed to be for a few weeks. Mike and James became very good friends. Mike would help James on the farm. Mike came to love the farm and farm work as much as James did.
I got to know James very well. I would go visit with him and we would sit on his back porch and he would play his guitar and sing. James was very talented. He loved to play his guitars. He would play as long as I would sit and listen. Other times we would sit on the back porch and James would tell me all about how he came to have the farm. He told me about his grandparents buying the farm. He told me about his grandparents raising ten children in the farmhouse. Tom Gullatt was one of their children. Now I am sitting on the porch of the house Tom Gullatt was raised in hearing stories of the Gullatt family. James told me about when his grandparents died he and his father Horace bought the farm from James’ aunts and uncles. I would tell James about my miniature animals on my little “farm” (one acre). I called it Little Bit Farm. He would come every chance he could to visit my miniature animals. He enjoyed my miniature animals so much.
James would let our four children ride 4 wheelers in the pastures, fish in his lake and hunt on his land. As our children grew they would help with hay and bush hogging and any other work that needed to be done on the farm. James became close with our family. He would come over for dinner and we would go out for pizza. My children would bring a plate from dinner over to him when he could not come over. James came for breakfast on Christmas morning for many years. He was always invited to our children's graduations and weddings. He came to know our son in laws and our daughter in law. James welcomed them to his farm. He was excited to hear all the details of our grandchildren when they were born and as they grew.
James was a wonderful blessing to our family. We were so blessed having James in our lives. I can’t imagine what our lives would have been without him being so much a part of it.
September 23, 2019 James Gullatt passed away. He had put my husband in his will in 2001. James had decided one year after he came to know my family, he wanted us to have his farm one day. For years we did not know what James had planned for his farm. A few years before he died he told my husband he had put him in his will. A few months before he died he showed Mike his will. He left everything he owned to my husband Mike.
One of the days James was in the hospital (the week before he died) He asked me if I would ever consider living in that old farmhouse. I told him, God willing, I would. James and Mike and I talked for hours that day about what James wanted for us. He told me to make the house beautiful and take care of his cows. God gave us that special time with James. That day was the last day James was aware we were there. The loss of James was overwhelming for Mike. He had lost his best friend. Mike would call James every morning. They would talk about how James was feeling and what needed to be done on the farm. Mike would go to James’ every day after work. And then… James was gone. No more phone calls. No one was at the farm. It was as if life stopped. But it didn't, the farm still needed to be cared for. Mike and I found we felt better when we were at James’ house. It made us feel close to James. We would go to the farm every day and begin the daunting task of going through James’ things. It was so hard. We were overwhelmed with emotions. Our loss of a close friend, the work that needed to be done on the farm, and the task of going through everything in the house. We were physically and emotionally drained. But James made this task of cleaning out the house a wonderful and exciting time! All of our children would come help us go through the things in the house. A few days into this process our son came to me and said he found a dollar bill with a note attached. I could tell it was James’ handwriting, but I didn’t know what to make of it. I told him to put it aside and we went back to work. A few hours later someone else found another one. A dollar bill with a different note. This continued for weeks. We found many, many dollars with notes from James. He had left us a scavenger hunt! What a wonderful thing for him to do for us. It felt like he was here with us as we worked. It was so James! He had been hiding notes for years for us. When we found the last note the house was cleared out! James’ wonderful surprise had made all the work so much easier. The house was ready for us to do whatever we wanted to do with it. A wonderful prize! Who would've thought how much we would look forward to going to work in that old house. We all wanted to be the one to find the next dollar with a note from James.
So here we are in 2021 and we now live in that wonderful old farmhouse on Jones Ferry Road. All because of a plan God had put in motion way back before I was born. It had been God’s plan for many years for my family to one day live on this farm. This 200 acre farm became our Little Bit Farm. We went from a one acre, miniature farm with miniature animals, to a 200 acre cattle farm. James knew for years his farm would one day be our Little Bit Farm.
The house on Jones Ferry Road was once the home for three generations of Gullatts for over a hundred years. Today that wonderful old farmhouse is Little Bit Farm. The home of Mike and Rachel McBurnett. All because of God’s plan!