Hunter likes cows lately.  Just about everything bigger than a dog that stands on four legs is a cow to him.  As soon as he gets a glimpse of one he moos and moos and says cow with his lips sticking out.  He really is the cutest thing that ever lived.

Since he hasn’t seen a cow close up ever before I decided today was the day he needed to have that experience.  There is a great park in Englewood (which is part of Denver) called Belleview Park that has a little petting farm.  Brenna and Logan took turns manning the camera because I was on baby patrol.

Hunter was pretty hesitant about being close to the animals.  He said cow over and over and mooed when the little calves they had were on the other side of the farm area from us or closed in a pen, but they were just too big for him up close.  He was wild about the chickens, though, and didn’t mind the goats and sheep.  He thought the pig was hilarious and laughed and laughed and tried to imitate the pig’s grunts and snorts.

The one who really had a good time was Ian.  He fell in love with this sheep and petted it there for about 10 minutes.  He didn’t mind when the white rooster tried to eat Buzz off of his shoe,

and he found a good friend in the bristly pig.

My animal loving Brenna had a good time too, and as we left she said, “I think maybe this is what I want to do when I grow up, I mean, those girls get are getting paid to take care of the animals.”  I guess being farm girls is just in our blood.  Animals just make life feel so– real, I guess.  I’ve never actually lived on a farm, but my mom grew up on one and when I was a little girl we visited my grandparents in the home where she grew up almost weekly.  I was always too self conscious to really say what I wanted or ask to help with the horses and be really involved in the workings of the place, but I would sit out in the yard and daydream about growing up and somehow inheriting that beautiful, perfect little place with its enormous sycamore trees and clothes line and peonies and berry patch and green pastures.  I really thought it was the most beautiful place on earth.  I had my wedding reception there.  Then the housing developments encroached on it and my grandparents had to sell it.  They moved farther away from town on lots of open land.  They made it beautiful, built stables and planted berries.  2 years ago now my grandpa passed away.  I remember a conversation I had with my grandma about selling that big place and moving into town closer to my mom so she wasn’t just out there all alone.  She said she’d like to, that she needed to, but that everything made her feel claustrophobic with their fences and little yards.  She said she was born a country girl and maybe she just needed the open spaces.

After that conversation I’ve wondered if maybe I was born a country girl too– if I have that yearning to live with space and trees and animals because my grandma passed it down to me– if it’s just in my blood…