“Oh, the kids. No doubt. Seeing their faces light up when they see everything here,” Shinar said. “That’s what keeps me coming back year after year. I especially like seeing them with the old-school cider house. I love watching the kids crank it up and then crush it and then taste it. We do it every year and I love watching the kids’ reaction to it.”

The event also featured wool spinning, plenty of pumpkins and a bean bag toss. The wool from the spinning comes from the sheep and the alpacas at the farm.

“It really gives the kids an opportunity to see what everything comes from,” Shinar said. “It’s not just the grocery store.”

“What I like is that you see families spending time together,” Executive Board member John Muras said. “And we make things low cost. It’s nice to come to events like this and not spend thousands of dollars. There are fun games for everyone to enjoy.”

Shinar said that the yearly event takes about two months of planning, but this year’s event was a little easier, with 55 volunteers featuring Cal Maritime cadets, Vallejo High School students and even a couple from Texas.

“It’s really hectic in the morning setting everything up, but the volunteers help so much,” Shinar said. “There is no way this can happen without them.”

Kirsten Caesar was at the event with her kids, Rory (5) and Kaylee (10 months), as well as Kristi Clover. Rory said his favorite part of the day was “the robots, petting the bunnies and the train rides.” “Oh my God, he loves trains, so we knew we had to come here when we found out about this,” Kirsten said. “When we were on the train his eyes were all wide.”

Nadia Caludatos was at the event with her young son. “A friend of mine told me about this and we knew we had to come,” Caludatos said. “We had been to the farm before but not for this event. We had come to spring events and summer events but nothing for the fall. He really loves pumpkins so this was very nice.”

The event helps raise funds to help the site’s infrastructure. Next week the site will begin construction on a new lower pasture fence, scheduled to be completed in about two weeks.

Saturday, however, was all about families and children.

“This is a generational thing as well,” Muras said. “Someone came here and said they used to come here 20 years ago, but this time they brought their own kids. Twenty years had gone by, but she still knew a lot of the names of the animals.”

“I grew up in Vallejo, so I used to come here as a kid,” Shinar said. “Seeing everything go down today really brings everything full circle.”
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The above article was in the Times~Herald, Sunday, April 24, 2022.
It was written by Thomas Gage, tgase@timeheraldonline.com.
The photos were by Chris Riley~Times~Herald.

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