Friday, April 11, 2008

Vegetarians Avert Your Eyes

Yesterday Miss Pink was singing in the car, to the tune of “The Farmer in the Dell”:

The cows give us milk, the cows give us milk
Hi ho the derry-o, the cows give us milk

She went on to sing about chickens giving us eggs, then a thought came to her: “Mom, what do pigs give us?”

I said, “Bacon.” Then immediately wondered if I would have to explain exactly how that happens. It’s not like the pig just donates the bacon and goes on its merry way.

She then said without skipping a beat, “Oh! Then I guess I need to sing the cows give us beef, too.”

She ate her chopped steak with gravy at dinner without any complaints.

79 comments:

  1. hehehe! I think we big people forget where our food comes from sometimes, too! But it's all good on my plate!

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  2. God bless pork. Your child is one after her uncle's heart.

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  3. My sons actually figured out that if we weren't going to be eating the farm animals, that they wouldn't have been bred to begin with... I thought it was a bit of brilliance on their part...

    :)

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  4. Hey, I really like your icon down your page, the 50's woman in the apron...I bought that notebook from HomeHardware. Anyhow, there's a site I happened upon today that you might like if you like that style: http://anapronaday@blogspot.com
    Check it out...looks like fun!

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  5. Livie has asked me several times, "Where does chicken come from?" It just goes to show how separate we keep our food and it's sources in our minds that she doesn't realize the word "chicken" as applies to what is on her plate is the same word that applies to the clucking bird.

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  6. I have a four year old with a fasciation in knowing which animal she is eating and an eight year old who swears she is a vegetarian. . .apparently between meals!

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  7. my grandfather used to say about breakfast that "the hens have an interest but the pigs are committed."

    I love it when people acknowledge that food doesn't just magically appear in cellophane wrappers.

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  8. Congrats on being the FB of the day! Kids make us get real in the cutest ways don't they :-)

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  9. congrats on being FB for the day. Cute Post. Call me a PIG - but I love breakfast!!!

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  10. My daughter once told me she wanted a "popcorn bush". She was 9! She is not exactly the brightest crayon in the box. Congrats on your day!

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  11. LOL! I grew up on a sheep farm (where the sheep were bred for meat, not wool) and would persist in driving my younger siblings (um, and parents) crazy by announcing loudly at dinner "Boy, Fluffy sure tastes better than I thought she would" as we were eating our umpteenth meal of lamburgers or spaghetti and lamballs. (Yes, we named *every single sheep* on the farm, despite the fact that most were being sold and/or slaughtered.)

    Little wonder that both of my sisters subsequently went through a vegetarian phase in their teens/early 20s... *whistling innocently*

    My kiddo is attending summer camp on a working farm (Grandma and Grandpa have long since given up the sheep - no free labor, whoops I mean children to work the farm anymore these days) and I'm counting on them to explain all these sticky details about where her beloved pepperoni and bacon and "chicken dinosaurs" come from... Though she does cheerfully accompany me to the butcher shop each week where they have 3-D models of a pig and a cow with all the cuts of meat drawn on the body. She can tell you where the "butt" is and where the bacon comes from, too. So maybe we're good on that one.

    Anyhow, congrats on being the SITSta of the day!

    Cheers!

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  12. lol! don't you love how kids just roll with it? sometimes they ask a bazillion questions about the most inane stuff and sometimes, they just accept a simple, basic answer to a potentially complicated question.

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  13. Congrats on SITS feature!!

    *thank goodness you didn't have to explain that one!

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  14. Hello SITSta! That's too funny

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  15. I'm waiting for Graham to figure this one out...The sign for chicken the animal and the chicken you eat is the same... He gives me a funny look when I hand him a chicken wing....

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  16. Too funny! My kids had a hard time with that whole concept.

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  17. I love how kids think. I wish my kids would just eat anything at all, other than junk.

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  18. lol! how cute! i don't see vegetarianism in her future :)

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  19. hehehe! That is too funny! :)

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  20. Congrats on being featured! My boy loves the bacon, bacon strips, round bacon, bacon bacon bacon.

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  21. Mommies give us babies, daddies.....what do daddies do????
    "Mommy can you tell me?"

    Very cute!

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  22. LOL Hopped on over from SITS. Congrats on your feature.

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  23. LOL. Mine one time said "Yuck! I would never eat a cow!" as they were downing a burger.

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  24. Its so funny how literal kids are I love it.
    Hey, my favorite time of day is when my husband walks through the door too. I get really upset when he is even a minute. Come on, honey its your turn, I'm done.

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  25. LOL, too funny! Kid's are great.

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  26. I made a pork roast for dinner the other night...and my youngest decided that she did not want to eat it. Because it was a poor piggy. And that she might want to become a vegetarian. And then all that stopped when her sister informed her that she'd have to give up bacon. This is a girl who likes bacon so much that I found bacon bandaids for her at perpetualkid.com. And she wears them proudly.

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  27. Nope, no animal rights getting in the way of that girl and dinner. So funny!

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  28. Over from SIS. Congrats on being the featured blooger :-)

    I was going through a list of stuff that came from cows, with one of my kids. It was a homework project, from memory.

    He was cool with milk, cream, cheese amd meat, but was rather horrified to find out the shoes he was wearing on his feet, also probably came fom a cow.

    "I'm wearing a dead cow??"

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  29. That is too cute, you little one is bright!

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  30. A girl after my own heart!

    Happy SITS day!

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  31. So cute!!!! Congrats, you Suacy SITSta!

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  32. Very cute... I love a kid that takes things in stride.

    Congrats on your SITS day!

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  33. My daughter is both an Animal Lover and a Meat Lover. I've no doubt that if she'd grown up on a farm, she wouldn't have any concerns with eating whatever she'd raised. I on the other hand would grow too attached.

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  34. HAHA! Too funny! I actually have a friend who didn't know that hamburger came from cows. She thought it came from pigs. Um...she was 20 at the time.
    Congrats on your SITS feature!

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  35. I've had the same hesitation in explaining this to my son. It sounds so barbaric when you say it out loud....

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  36. Hee-hee! Yes, the pig is more committed to the process, isn't he?

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  37. We have had the whole cow-beef, chicken-poultry, pig-pork discussion many times at our house. Not one of them has ever balked at the thought.
    Yummy song.
    Happy SITS Day.

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  38. Happy SITS day. That's really cute. I think the cows would tell her to Eat Mor Chicken.

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  39. Hey, congrats on being the featured blogger on SITS! I was sure I'd left a comment when I read this before...hmmm...getting forgetful
    Sandi

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  40. As Homer Simpson would say...."MMMMM Bacon!!!"

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  41. Sounds like something my kids would do/say.

    Nice ta meetcha! Have a great weekend!

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  42. Too funny! I've had a few moments where something (truthful) came out of my mouth and a second later I realized that I'd need to add some context that I may or may not have been planning on. Kudos to her for accepting and thinking broadly enough to remember the beef!

    And congrats to you for being the featured SITSta today!

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  43. My husband and I love some bacon. And our children do, too. He swears that there should be bacon at every meal, despite what we are having.

    Congrats on the SITS spotlight today!!

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  44. What a cutie! Kids are so smart sometimes! We love us some bacon in this household!!

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  45. smart little girl! too cute! I love my beef and bacon. ;)

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  46. Came over from SITS. Hysterical! Can't wait to look around.

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  47. My kids are canivors, too. Their preferred diet is like this: meat/cheese/meat/cheese/CANDY/meat/cheese/CHIPS/cheese/macaroni/meat.

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  48. Found you through SITS. Love this post. Aren't kids so cute? I can't wait until my boy starts...well...starts saying something other than gagaga

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  49. I'm glad other SITS women go through the same coversation with their kids.

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  50. Congrats on being the featured blogger!

    I often wonder how to deal with questions about how we actually get meat from animals. Ugh!

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  51. Wow! We haven't been met with this question yet, but I am sure when the time comes our animal loving daughter will be horrified!

    Happy SITS day!

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  52. The pigs give us bacon and then WE go on our merry way, lol. Bacon is my BFF.

    You have one smart kiddo on your hands! My daughter just learned that song in preschool, and for some reason cant' remember the correct words and makes things up. But her renditions are a lot less entertaining!

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  53. That's too funny. If I think too hard about where my food comes from, I can totally mess things up for myself and not be able to eat certain things anymore. It does not matter that I'm fully aware that its all my head, I still can't eat certain things.

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  54. I'm a meat eater through and through. It's good to see you're teaching your children the facts of life and food. :-)

    My family and I were eating dinner with my aunt and her family several years ago. We were eating pork. My younger sister, just a little girl at the time, called out when she finished her piece, "I think I need some more pig!" She knew where her food came from!

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  55. Hey HF. My family used to live by a farm, so we were all very aware of what happens to a dairy cow when she has outlived her usefulness. Hee Hee I think it's great that your children are aware... just goes to show that kids are capable of understanding so much and not needing censorship on EVERYTHING. Good Mommy!!!

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  56. Too cute! I actually am I vegetarian but my children are not...my daughter loves telling people I am "allergic to bacon"...no, honey I'm not, I just don't like it! :) Happy SITS day!

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  57. HAHAAH OH my day is coming. we love meat around here.

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  58. Miss Pink cracks me up. She is one smart cookie.

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  59. LOL. Bacon is the best. Although red meat runs a close second in the AFRo household. Congratulations on your day!

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  60. what fun! kids say the darndest things!

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  61. My three year old thinks I'm FU-neeee when I say that yes, we DO eat birds, even though he eats almost no meat that isn't from a chicken...

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  62. Too funny. We're omnivores at our house too.

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  63. We've always been upfront and honest about where various meats come from and our oldest has never been offended, grossed out or saddened. It's all in how you present it I guess...

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  64. Smart little girl you have there! Sweet, too :)

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  65. isn't is refreshinf how matter of fact they can be some times?

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  66. Whew, what a relief she took that so well! Smart little girl, cute song she made up. :o)

    Enjoy your SITS day in the sun!

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  67. I don't care where it comes from as long as it doesn't have a face on it when I eat it. The kid knows a good thing when she's got one.

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  68. That's my kind of gal!

    SITS sistah here and I'm so glad you were featured - I just love your blog!

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  69. So glad you're the featured blogger!
    I was rolling at the thought of the pig donating bacon. You have one smart little chicky!

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  70. I think bacon may be another one of my addictions. Sigh. Blessings, marlene

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  71. where does broccoli come from? Seriously - you need cheese and butter to put on broccoli or else it is just, well...broccoli!

    Where does cheese come from, where does butter come from - oh it just goes on and on!!!

    Shhh, just keep eating the bacon...

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