Bottle Calves

Learning responsibility and taking pride in your work is something everyone needs to learn.  The younger a person is when they learn this, the better.  This spring we decided to get 4 bottle calves for the kids to raise.  Granted, my wife and I are doing most of the work right now, but G. and R. are getting better at feeding them.  Once the calves start eating hay & grain there will be more for them to do.

R. & G. with 'Little Ricky'.  He was only a few hours old.

As a side note, our kids are very creative when it comes to naming animals.  Where some of these names came from, I do not know.  Most of them are calves: 

Crocodile
Onadocious
Hammer
Mallet
VCR
VCR(2)
Whitepaw
Q
Sophie
Muck
Grouchy
Monster
Wheeler
Little Ricky
Fred Mertz

Karen helping A. feed the calf she named 'Fred Mertz'.

G. with 'Little Ricky' and 'Fred Mertz' (we are I Love Lucy fans)

This girl was very excited to get to help take care of the calves.

We also decided to start teaching them the business side of raising cattle.  I printed off an Excel spreadsheet I made for them, and that night we had a family home evening lesson on accounting and record keeping.  G. and R. are each filling out an expense sheet for these calves.  They log in every expense and will add in the revenue when they sell their calves.  With any luck, they'll make a little money.

Karen showing R. what to write on his expense sheet.

Adding up the numbers on the calculator was their favorite part.

G's expense sheet.

He's very proud to be doing his own accounting work.

Hard work is something fewer and fewer people are willing to do as they grow up.  By the time the youngsters of today enter the work force, the few who have the skills, ambition, and willingness to get up early, get dirty, and do what it takes to get a job done will be the most successful.  We want our kids to be part of that group.

A. and 'Little Ricky'.