Friday afternoon found my parents and I packing my little car with luggage and leaving shortly thereafter to head east approximately 320 miles (5 hours) to visit Michael D. (he's been here a couple of times as you may recall) and to meet part of his family. We're grateful that my brothers were willing to do the chores at home so we could go!!
Minnesota is filled with beauty at this time of the year!
We knew we had arrived at the right place when we saw these signs at the end of a long driveway...
...and we saw several barns and cows the next morning... I did take these pictures the following day, as it was dark when we arrived.
Their horse (Wisp) and pony (Oreo)....
The house in the woods...
My dad and Mr. D (Dale) seemed to find plenty to talk about,
both being dairymen in the past and/or present...
Q: What do you see many of on a dairy farm?
A: ____ ....No, not flies. Cows and calves!
Consequently, I have a lot of cow and calf pictures to share
(my mom and I both were taking pictures)....
It's always interesting to me to see different people's farms and how they do things! This is only half of the barn. There's another row like this on the other side of the alleyway...
Here's Michael, feeding the cows a mid-morning snack...
Mmmm, "Haylage" smells almost good enough to eat!
An oats/radish/peas cover-crop in one of their fields...
The trees are SO beautiful and plentiful around there!
More beauty...
I was glad we didn't see any wolves or bears! Either would have ruined this picture of serenity!
Michael moves an electric fence around daily (when he's there) to provide the cows with different cells of grass and clover to eat. These are some very happy cows...
There were cute little calves to pet and watch in these pens...
Mrs. D (Kathy), bedding down the barn before evening chores, as the cows stay indoors overnight.
Letting the girls in the barn...
It's hard to see it in this picture, but each cow has access to water while she's in her stall.
They are waiting for somebody to cut open those haybales sitting there!
We met Michael's older brother, James on Saturday when he came "Home" for the weekend. He's on the right, telling a story or something... We enjoyed all of them, as they're very down to earth, sensible people. :)
Milking time! Dale milks in the evenings, Michael in the mornings, and Kathy helps with the calves and other things at both times, it sounded like.
These are Michael's sister, Rachael's Fantail pigeons...
I wonder if they ever get a neckache?
On the path that leads from the house to the barn...
My mom and Lily...
See!! I told you it was tempting to eat that sweet smelling feed! ;)
Yay! Hay!
Barns can be great places to rest and think...
We helped them (although we didn't have to do much) sort off a heifer and a cow that are getting close to calving and we ran them over to the milking herd. The cow was cooperative, but the heifer, not so much!
My parents and I stayed at a hotel in Little Falls (about 10 miles away from the farm). Sunday morning, we went in search of the D.'s church in the small town of Cushing. We found it pretty quickly, but as we were early, we went back out to the main road and explored Cushing (which took about 5 minutes). :)
Oh, this picture was after church, when we got back to the D's farm and Sam (Michael's dog) greeted my dad warmly!
Mrs. D. feeding the doggies some leftovers from the church potluck:
This picture makes me laugh!
It looks like my parents were doing some choreographed dance steps or something...? It was chilly, so that explains the hands in the pockets look, but I'm not sure why they were walking sideways? :)
Back to church though...
It was an extra special service that week, as their church was celebrating it's anniversary. The Kingery family came and sang several songs and Mr. Kingery spoke for a while. They are a home schooling family from MN. Their music was GREAT and just seeing their love for each other and for God was so encouraging too!! I'm planning to get some of their music CDs in the near future.
The Kingery family has a website: http://www.thekingeryfamily.com/
and a You-Tube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMOyrHaY6aICB1aljJ19WnA ,
for those of you who may be interested.
After the concert, we all enjoyed a potluck meal, then after some visiting, we went back to the D's farm to visit for a couple more hours yet before leaving for home that afternoon.
It was a great mini-vacation and we're very grateful to the D. family for their hospitality and to God, for the safety in our travels (especially since we almost were in an accident on the way over)!
Yesterday, I was babysitting almost all day. My mom was busy with garden produce. The guys moved hay home and worked in the shop.
Today, my dad hauled grain and my brothers worked on the farm. My mom and I worked in the kitchen and enjoyed a little break when Josephine and her parents and little sister came over for a bit to get a computer from Andrew.
Tonight, I'm counting my friends as one of the Lord's greatest blessings!
Please join us in prayer for our friend, Ellen (her husband had the 90th birthday party last weekend), as she woke up mostly blind yesterday or today and the Dr.s aren't sure she'll get her sight back, but God can do anything!!
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~Cora B.