Pampered Pets Petting Farm

 My brother and Jake graduated from ATI with a girl that I only knew by Missy.  Through  a few stories, weddings and Facebook I have come to appreciate her drive for life.  I have really enjoyed following her Petting Zoo stories on Facebook.  Today I bring you their story. Thanks for sharing it Missy.

Well if God dosent have a plan than I dont know who
does. It's so funny how starting out buying a pygmy goat for our
daughters first birthday, can turn into a very happening and fun
petting farm business in less than a few years. Starting a traveling
educational petting farm was never something I thought I would do when
graduating college but neither was starting a family around a year
after getting married. So basically the small mustard seed or the
pygmy goat named "Lilly" was the start of a business we never saw
coming. 

"Lilly", this goat has a story of her own ...she has had a
c-section, been attacked by our beloved mini donkey "Spanky" and many
other close to death encounters but she is the heart of our little
business. Shortly after seeing how much our little family loved this
one goat, little by little we started having people ask us if we would
take on another animal. So then before we knew it we owned a
potbellied pig, dogs, cats, rabbits and chickens. 

Then one day I remembered how fun it was to go with my friend Lindsay in college to
the sale barns. I thought I would love to do that again and I then started
going to the Exotic animal sale in Mt Hope. I havent missed a sale yet
in 5 years. From that sale barn there has been so many memories for our family.
It's better than going to the zoo and the kids can see animals that
they have never seen before. From there we have made homes for other
potbellied pigs, a Miniature Horse name Ginger, a Miniature Donkey named
Spanky, a Jacob Sheep named "Baabaa", an Alpaca named "Rudy", several
goats, rabbits, a babydoll sheep named "Scruffy" and a few others. Every
spring and fall we go to a local dairy farm and buy a bull calf and
bring it along to the zoos and then when it gets too big we take it to
my dads place to feed it out and that's the beef our family shares every
year.

So as of today we have about 12 different breeds of animals that we
take traveling to different events. Including.....a Mini Donkey, a Mini
Horse, Goats, Sheep, Alpaca, a Holstein Calf, Bunnies, Potbellied pigs,
Chicks, Ducks, Puppies and Kittens. And I cant forget to include when
we go to bigger events we take the corn table that the wonderful FFA
kids built. This is a huge box full of corn and toys for the kids
to play in. The Corn Table is a HUGE HIT!!!






Our Dreams
Someday we would love to have a bigger farm with more acres for our
little farm animals. We recently purchased an older 40 foot horse
trailer that I would love to have restored with custom made fences
just for the animals. We hope to make a difference in peoples awareness about
animals. You would be shocked of the number of adults that do not know the difference    between a cow and goat.


Right now this isn't a business we do to get rich that is for sure. 
If it wasn't for our dear friends and family it probably wouldn't be
possible, but this is a way for adults and children to interact with
animals they may have never seen before. It is currently paying our
feed bills and teaching our children lessons in hard work and
responsibilty so for us its totally worth it. To see the excitement in
our kids faces and the pride they have in the petting farm is worth
more than any money.

"Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will succeed." Proverbs 16:3