The Original Multitasking Mama

Yesterday, Sophia’s class took a field trip to the only dairy farm in our county. I got to chaperone, and I’m so glad I was able to go. It was very educational!

First of all, nothing can really prepare you for the sight of cows up close. If you see them out in a pasture, or on Ree’s blog, they look so peaceful, even cute. Up close, they still have the big soulful eyes and the awkward horizontal ears. But when you’re standing within arms length of a cow, you notice two things. First, they’re a whole lot bigger up close than they seem at a distance. Second, they are some filthy, nasty animals. I have never seen so much poo covering so much animal in my life. There was poop on their feet, legs, tails, hind quarters… even on their udders. And the thought of milk that we drink coming out of something that nasty dirty made me feel queasy.

And oh, my word!  Just be glad this isn’t smell-o-vision.

Fortunately, we went into the milking parlor and saw first hand that they give the udders a good washing before attaching the little suction devices. That put my mind at ease a great deal!

And the slobber! Oh, man, could these girls drool! Look at this one:

So what did I learn? Well, it takes about 6 or 7 minutes to milk a cow with this machinery, and they are milked twice a day.

From there we went to see some calves. They were absolutely precious. Sophia thought these two were especially cute because they were “snuggling.”

From there we went to the garden section where we learned about composting, attracting butterflies to your garden, why you should plant flowers near your vegetables (I can’t remember, but it was a good reason!), and a really cool trick for growing tomatoes. If you have a tomato plant, you should run your fingers across the top of it every day. This will trick the plant into “thinking” that there is another plant growing up over it. As a result, it will not grow taller, but rather thicker and fuller, and it will produce more tomatoes. Cool, huh?

Then we went to the petting barn. and they had the most adorable baby chicks there. Here’s Sophia holding one:

And after that it was games and playtime, followed by a snack and the ride back to school. On the way back, I said to Sophia, “Wow, that was a lot of fun, wasn’t it?”

She replied, “Yes! But I sure am glad I don’t have to get milked!” She clasped her hands in front of her and looked up at the sky. “Thank you, God, for not making me a cow!”

My thoughts exactly.