It was a chilly morning as I headed out to meet up with the other Field Moms for our road trip to visit two Illinois Farms.  We met at a designated location and rode together to the farms. We were all a little unsure about what the day would bring. What would the farms look like? Would the farmers be welcoming? Would the farms be clean?  Many things went thru our heads as we talked amongst ourselves on our early morning drive.

 We arrived Larson farms and were greeted with open arms by the Martz family and grandma even had pot of coffee ready for us. Larson Farms was huge to say the least, 6,350 acres plus 3,500 head of cattle. This farm operates with 4 generations of family, even little Jaxson was present for our tour. We were given the opportunity to learn more about the farm, tour the farm and have all of our questions answered.

4:00 am. .  . up to finish last minute chores before guests arrive (shavings down in the calf barn and for milk-a-cow, feed samples out, etc).
 
5:30. . . workers begin to arrive: FFA students to help with parking (our front hay field, with its second crop finished, turns into the parking lot); workers for the pancake breakfast (our tool shop and machine shed turn into kitchen and eating area); workers to serve ice cream (our garage turns into an ice cream parlor); other volunteers are here to give out information at the milking parlor, in the milk house, at the heifer barn, and I’m out in the calf barn with my sister.