A Day at the Farm

We spent Wednesday as a family visiting some lovely friends of ours to celebrate their son's fifth birthday. They live on a small homestead about 90 minutes outside of Charlotte. We fulfilled our roles as City Folk, exclaiming with excitement when we saw along the drive a dead deer, a dead mouse in the road, and--most exotic of all--a gopher standing sentry in the grass.

Our children have no pets whatsoever, so you can imagine their awe at this family's cat, dog, dairy cow, calf, coop of chickens, pen of meat rabbits, and several pigs. We had some useful conversations on the way home, sparked by the children saying how they wanted to come back to see the calf "when it is all grown up!" and our explaining that the calf was going to become food for the family before too much longer.

"Yum, this dress is delicious!"

As might be expected at a Catholic clan gathering, we laughed to note that there were at least three Katherines, two Christophers, two Johns, and a Mary plus a Margaret plus a Margaret Mary  . . . but with so many kids among the various families running around, I'm sure I didn't catch all the duplicative saint names!

The children have all declared that they want to live with this family forever and, if that is not possible, they want to go back and visit there tomorrow.