Thursday, July 23, 2009

Thank You Mary Moo Cow

A story in pictures.
I have been slacking in my writings lately. And I wanted so much to write about the trip we took last week. We met my friends Tina and Carrie and their boys at Fair Oaks Farms. I'm especially grateful as I write with my afternoon snack of rice krispie treat and a big fat glass of milk.

Here's our first round, I hadn't eaten breakfast, so I sampled a yogurt parfait. Oh my. I have long said that Fair Oaks farms makes the best grilled cheese sandwich Ever, but time to try something else. Grilled Cheese came later. But here we are getting sociable: Chris (Sam is in his bucket behind him), Tina and Evan (age 2 1/2), Brett (age 1) and Carrie.



Here's how Sam spent most of the trip. Sleeping.



Of course, we had to stop at the Dairy Playground. It was a nifty trick explaining we didn't want to pay for the bus tour, just get the kids on the playground. Next time it might be easier to just wrestle the two boys alone on the bus.
Meanwhile the boys had a great time. Brett settled in the cereal bowl, aka ball pit and Did Not Move. Meanwhile trying to pin down Chris and Evan was like herding cats.



Action shot of Tina and Carrie playing with Brett, Evan, and Chris.



Evan and Chris found great joy in the Ice Cream Slide.



It was a big favorite of Chris's too. He was bugging me about "The Side" as soon as I told him we were going to have to 'drive far to see friends, cows, and eat cheese'. Apparently he knew this meant playground too.



Evan and Chris also had fun jumping on the mats shaped like slices of cheese.


But my boy does Cheesy pretty well.



The Cows. This was by far the saddest experience I've had at this farm. I mean I knew in my head that they had these cows on display having their babies, and we could see them being milked. But I guess I hadn't realized how completely sad it was. When we got to the Birthing Barn to "see cows" two calves had already been born and their mamas were cleaning them off. One cow was trying to nurse in the mama cow's armpit, she hadn't quite figured it out. Then a tech came in, and nudged the Mama out, the baby was so unsteady on her feet that she couldn't keep up. Mama was taken away and the calf was alone, the tech quickly returned with a wheelbarrow, and scooped her up to be put in the baby display room.



My eyes welled, I didn't realize the separation from Mama and Baby took so little time. This baby was only 2 hours old. We watched as they brought in a another laboring Mama Cow, and then as we left we found the baby, in the newborn nursery on display. I nearly cried. She looked so sweet, and pitiful. Maybe I'm just too much of a nursing Mama myself that watching this baby who got No Time to nurse with her own mama except to nuzzle her armpit just got to me.



I wish I could say that my heart was turned, that I can no longer eat meat or drink dairly. But I love milk, or any mutation of diary. I couldn't give it up. So I just have to say for the record, Thank You Mama Cow, who I gave the nickname Mary Moo Cow (from the show Arthur that Chris and I were watching last week.

Thank you Mary Moo Cow. I am so grateful for what you do, that you provide milk for me and mine, so that I can feed my little baby too. Thank you.

Meanwhile here's Sam, with Chris and Brett watching the baby cow the boys thought checking out the baby cows was cool.



But running wild was even more cool.




One of the boys' favorite parts was riding in the Choo Choo train which was in operation just outside the birthing barn. This cheered everyone up. Evan and Chris shared a car, being the older boys, and also they climbed in the front car and closed the door, leaving no option but for Tina and I to sit back and watch. They put their heads together and were having a great time Toddler Talking.



Carrie and Brett were able to squeeze in a car together.




Still smiling and chattering on the home stretch. Yes, those boys had some fun on the train.

3 comments:

Carrie said...

Excellent, excellent post. Summed up the day perfectly.. thanks for taking the time to share :).

Cathy said...

Only took me a week to do it.

Tina said...

Great day! Great blog! I'm so behind on my blogging.