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Old Macdonald Had a Farm

 
gardener
Posts: 1050
Location: Zone 6 in the Pacific Northwest
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Yes, this is about the children's song.

My one year old does not love car rides and if it is a long car ride and/or close to naptime, she would rather scream for forty minutes than fall asleep like all these kids I hear about who think motor vehicles are equivalent to sedatives. The only thing we have found that calms her down and eventually puts her to sleep is to sing Old Macdonald. Over. And. Over. And. Over.

I think the longest we've sung it is an hour. (Trust me, it's better than hearing her scream, but not by much!)

Occasionally she'll be satisfied with other songs, "If You're Happy and You Know It", "Wheels on The Bus", etc but usually she keeps crying until we sing Macdonald. We've even resorted to "Old Macdonald's Exotic Animal Farm" to give us more scope but we usually only make it fifteen minutes before we have to start repeating ourselves.

So I have a challenge for all you creative permie people! Can you help me come up with new things to sing about on Old Macdonald's farm?

What would be on Old Macdonald's Regenerative/Permaculture Farm?

If you're not familiar, the format is:
"Old Macdonald had a farm,
E I E I O
And on that farm he had a [type of animal]
E I E I O
With a [animal sound] and a [animal sound] there.
Here a [sound], there a [sound], everywhere a [sound, sound]"
And so on...

So I need a noun followed by the sound that noun would make.
 
gardener
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Could you add farm equipment to your list?  Tractors and haybalers and forklifts and sometimes substitute an action or result?

On his farm he baled his hay.. eieio here a bale there a bale

On his farm he had/grew some corn
Here a pop there a pop

...grew some carrots
Here a crunch there a crunch

Ate some watermelon
Here a seed there a seed (traditional spitting the seeds as you eat)
 
gardener
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I empathize with you! My one year old doesn't mind car rides, but there are plenty of other times that we've sung the same song over and over and over again to ease a crying fit.

Along the same lines as Casie's suggestions:
On that farm he sowed some seed...with a sprout growing here and a sprout growing there. Here a sprout, there a sprout.

On that farm he raised a baby...with a waa waa (baby crying) here and a waa waa there.

On that farm he jumped in rain puddles...with a splash splash here and a splash splash there. Here a splash, there a splash.
 
pollinator
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I can relate to the screaming and the repetitive singing. I feel for you.

I amuse the children by singing about them. Old McDonald has a _____, With a What? Why? What? here and a Can I have a snack there. etc etc.

They're also cool with wild animals in the song. Any animal they can think of.
 
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