4:35 AM

That's the time we all woke up to head to the Rosa Brothers Dairy Farm. 

Holly Rosa had contacted me months ago after I left a message, letting me know they could help me cross off a bucket-list item: milking a cow. We finally found a weekend that would work for us, booked a hotel, and packed up the gang.

We met Mr. Rolland Rosa at the milking barn at 5am. Several milkers were leaving because they had done most of the milking by then. Did you get that? Most of the milking by then. We were at a smaller barn where they care for the cows who may be sick or have just given birth and need some extra TLC. 

They have to milk their 1,000 cow herd every single day, twice a day. That means each cow is milked via machine for 8 minutes. The two Rosa brothers are third generation farmers and still see over each milking as well as the other process to care for the cows.

And because cows get easily spooked, are creatures of habit, and can see almost 360 degrees, they don't usually allow strangers into their area. There's a chance of being kicked and these are huge animals. I was so grateful that they made an exceptional exception to the normal processes they have. 

Mr. Rolland gave me a quick lesson in hand-milking. 

Then he let me go to town for as long as I wanted. :) 

Hand-milking was so much harder than I had expected!! Mr. Rolland's dad and siblings had to milk 11 cows each by hand twice a day when they were growing up. I can not even imagine. Especially based on the five minutes I actually milked. After awhile my hand cramped so then he let me put on the pump machine to see how it works. Quite similar to a human pump, but more vacuum power and has two extra covers. 

 I liked have some background knowledge already about how this whole thing works. ;) There are so many similarities between both Mamas. And much like what I've experienced from nursing, feeding time provides relief. You could tell some of these cows were antsy to get things going!

 W got in on the milking too. He thought the texture of the cow's teat was more rubbery than he expected and the technique was different that he would have expected. He was seriously rocking and rolling by the end. Haha! Much more of a natural than me. ;)

The whole experience was amazing. Our entire gang had a blast and learned so much. You could tell the farm take great pride in caring for their herd {we learned later on the farm tour just how well they do that}. It truly is an amazing operation to gather the 8,000 gallons of milk these cows produce. 

After they milked the last "special needs" cow, we loaded everyone up and went straight back to the hotel for breakfast and a rest. :) We had more adventure to partake in and needed a little bit of shut-eye.