Our Little Boys Meet Some Cool Human Boys

 I was thrilled when a dear friend, Marilyn...also a retired teacher, contacted me the other day and wanted to bring her grandsons out sometime this week to visit the alpacas. We scheduled a farm visit for this morning and since it was a perfect 70 degree, very low humidity kind of summer day I decided to take Brigid, my spinning wheel, out to the front porch of our little store/studio to await their arrival. I am doing a spinning demonstration on Sunday afternoon for the 4-H alpaca group at the Crawford County Fair in Bucyrus, so I needed a little practice on the roving that was made from our little brown Brutus's first year fleece. It is so fine and soft, and it handles differently than the llama/merino blend that I have been working on.

After a half hour I had gotten a good feel for how the roving was going to spin up, when Marilyn and her husband, Greg, and their grandsons pulled up. Fortunately, everyone in the group were animal lovers because, Callie can be overwhelming when she is acting in her capacity as our formal greeter. Ethan, the younger brother, really took to Callie and showered her with lots of affection. Callie would have gone home with him if we had let her.

After a brief meeting with the females of the herd and a little background information about alpacas, we left the barn and went out to the little boy's pasture. The girls, Took, Leezza and Mango are a little backward with new visitors and tend to lag back. Mango's pregnancy is starting to show and she is more uncomfortable and tending to lay around more than usual. She is due in early September. Leezza should be due about two to three weeks later and is not showing yet. Asterius and Brutus, on the other hand, are always up for visitors especially those with handfuls of their favorite treat, sweet feed. Marilyn, Ethan, Jackson, the elder brother, and I all went into the pasture with the boys while Greg looked on. 

Without much hesitation, our little boys trotted up to the human boys to check them out.

The minute they realized that Jackson and Ethan had sweet feed to offer both Asterius and Brutus were eager to be friends.

Ethan got an alpaca "kiss" on the forehead from Asterius.

Asterius was apparently in a kissing kind of mood today because he also graced Jackson and Marilyn with kisses.

One of the things I have enjoyed most about owning these gentle, curious animals is the new friendships that we have made and the old friendships that have been strengthened by the farm visits. It's not an exaggeration when I say that I really love having people visit the farm to become acquainted with our little herd. I am so lucky to be able to hang out in the pasture and the shop with my guests and our alpacas.