At the Farm

Yesterday we had such a fun evening at my Aunt Marie's farm.  We are studying a unit about "ungulates" in science which means we are studying hooved animals.  We just started learning about the "two-toed" ungulates this week, and cows were the first animal in the chapter.  Soooooo, the first thing I thought of was calling Aunt Marie! She and my Uncle Randy have lived on the dairy farm most of their married life.  They moved to the farm 6 years or so after they got married. Previously, my uncle was a mechanic.  They decided to move to the farm and start a whole new way of life.  At the time, they had 3 kids; Jake was 5, Sarah, was 3, and Dave was 1!!!!

I remember having such a fun time when we would go to Aunt Marie's house when I was younger and I really wanted the kids to feel and experience the farm.  Needless to say, they loved it!! I asked the kids afterward if it was what they expected or if it was different and Ruby said, "It was way cooler than I expected!"

We went through all the barns of cows from newborn calf all the way to milking cows.  WOW, farming is ALOT of work! My cousin Mary took us through the milking barn, I think it was surprising to the kids when they saw how "mechanical" it is.  On our way I asked the kids how cows were milked, and they described pulling the udder into a bucket and filling it with milk.  When they saw the actual process of the big cows coming in and standing in a line and getting their udders cleaned with iodine and the milking machines attached they were very impressed with the whole process!

The highlight of the day for the kids was working with Aunt Marie in her calf barn.  She allowed them to feed and water the calves and then the newborn babies she let the kids feed them their bottles! There was actually a baby in the calf barn that was born just hours before we got there!

We are so thankful to my aunt for taking the time out of her busy day to show our kids what it looks like to run a dairy farm!!