A Fair-ly Good Day

On a warm and beautifully sunny Saturday in late August we made our way to the Montgomery County Fair.  We've never been to a fair as a family, but the week prior to attending the fair I finished reading Charlotte's Web to the girls and it just seemed to fit as the perfect ending to our reading of the book.  If you're not sure of the connection between the book and the fair, you should check out Charlotte's Web from the library.  It's a quick, fun and easy read.  If there are a few small children around, they'll like it, too.

We started at a display sponsored by the fire department.  They had a moon bounce shaped like a fire dog and the two older girls had a grand time of jumping in it.

Aliyah kept repeating that she didn't want to go inside.  So, she hung out with the Joes while I supervised the jumping.  It seems our next stop, the sheep and goats

were much more her speed.

They were incredibly soft and kind of cute.

Joey was clueless about the animals, but enjoyed people watching from the stroller.

We watched some goat judging in the arena after seeing the sheep.  The girls were fascinated by this and sat for a very long time watching the goats in the arena come and go.

We made a stop to see the bunnies, marveled over how one judges a bunny, ate some sandwiches and fruit for lunch and then played some games.  The girls really wanted to do this bean bag toss.

After having the rules explained both Xandra

and Theia give it a try.

Theia met with some success and they were both rewarded with a small packet of candy.

Afterward we played in the community square, a spot designed just for kids with lots of free activities.  These crazy bumper donuts were one of their favorites.

They also played in the soybeans and played life sized Connect Four.

We found a free face painting booth with ice cold water and stickers.  The girls were very patient and happy while they waited their turn.  There was only one person in line when we got there, so we also had a very short wait.

The Joes headed off exploring while we waited at the face painting and when they returned Joey had literally fallen asleep while being carried up on Joe's shoulders.  He had his head resting on Joe's head and was completely asleep.  We moved him to the snuggli for a more comfortable rest and ventured on to see some cows, get some free balloons and find the horses.  On our way we stopped to watch some very small pigs and ducks race. 
After watching for a few minutes we decided to head on our way only to realize that Aliyah was missing, for the second time.  She wandered away in the sheep barns and almost before we knew she was missing a nice lady was returning her to us.  This time we were on a busy sidewalk with hundreds of people and we had no idea how long she'd been gone or in what direction she'd gone.  I stayed with the kids, looking this way and that and Joe headed off in the direction we'd come to see if she'd wandered in that direction.  Joe found her looking very sad and looking as if she wanted to ask this other little girl for help, but instead she was just standing there pouty faced and staring.

He snapped this picture (she's the one over by the wagon and if you look closely, you can see her pouty lip) and then talked with her and they rejoined the rest of us.  After the horses, everyone was pretty hot and tired, so we ended our day at the fair and stopped on the way home at McDonald's for an ice cream cone.  Each girl got their OWN cone and they were all in heaven.

They were also very messy, but they didn't care one bit about the mess as they happily marched around outside eating ice cream and singing.

It was a fair-ly good end to a fair-ly good day.