I love Sandra Boynton. “But Not the Hippopotamus” is kind of a tragic book, though. Imagine if you could really only do things your name rhymed with. None of our names rhyme with fair, but we went anyway!
We haven’t been to the fair with the kids since we’ve lived here. In fact, I can only remember ever having been to the fair twice before in my life: once when I was a kid, and then I have very vague memories of going to one in Massachusetts one time when Ari was a baby. But every year my facebook feed lights up with tales of trips to the fair, so we decided this was finally our year! You know, the year when we have a baby to haul around with us. We’re always thinking!
The only night that worked for us to go, owing to Dave’s tutoring schedule and the play Gus is doing right now, happened to be free admission night. It was very crowded. I have no idea if it was way more crowded than other nights or not. But it was crowded. We had a good time and managed to spend a lot of money despite the free admission. Isn’t that always the way?
We were meeting friends there, but we were the first to arrive, so we spent some time wandering around looking at everything:
Note: crowds
Everyone except my oldest and most jaded was pretty excited about the petting barn:
Then we bought some overpriced fair food:
Shortly after the overpriced food, our friends showed up. We bought the kids unlimited ride tickets (for $18: the other special of the night, and maybe another thing drawing crowds?)
Whenever I go to places that have rides that aren’t Disney World, I’m astounded at how long one has to wait in line for rides, compared to Disney World. Despite the unlimited ride passes, we only had time to do a few. But it looks like the kids had fun while waiting:
We let the three twelve year olds go off on their own for awhile, and they had a great time. Their absence, plus the fact that Ari doesn’t want me to post any pictures of him lately, explains the lack of pictures of them here. They rode the sky buckets, and I talked Ari into letting me put this picture in here, at least:
Everyone waited in line for a million years for the ferris wheel:
And then it was time to go home!
So now we know what we’ve been missing all these years. There’s a lot we didn’t get to see, like the guy who makes sculptures out of tree trunks with a chainsaw. And the tigers. But tigers are scary. I didn’t want to see them anyway, because they’d probably have eaten me.
All in all, it was a great time, but I’m thinking maybe a once every two or three years kind of event, rather than a not to be missed. But maybe we’d feel differently if we’d watched the chainsaw guy.
And here’s a quick foster dog update: Ginger (now Fendi) got adopted a week and a half ago, which freed up a space for…..
Peabody!
So far he’s pretty awesome. My last two fosters were great dogs (we came relatively close to keeping Ginger, in fact), but they both had their share of issues, including but not limited to not being house trained. So far Peabody seems very emotionally healthy AND hasn’t had a single accident (knock wood. He’s only been here two days). He’s cuddly and playful, and the other dogs are a little bit obsessed with him. We’re thinking maybe wire haired dachshund mix, based on those stumpy little legs.
I love your photos from the fair. And when I scrolled down to the bottom I am all smitten with your latest foster. How stinkin adorable is he?
Thanks, Julia–we’re pretty smitten with him, too 🙂
that foster is so sweet. i think fairs are ovepriced and overcrowded, to, but the kids love them and they are uch a quintessential american activity.
It’s true. Some things you just have to do, I guess!
Peabody looks a lot like my Annabelle 🙂 http://sarahmdorseydesigns.blogspot.com/2012/12/annabelles-christmas-photos.html
We think that she is a long hair jack russell/beagle mix
oh, wow–they do look alike! Except, yeah, I can see the beagle in Annabelle’s ears and markings on her back. How cute is she?!
This looks so fun! It’s been ages since I’ve been to the fair, too.
Oh I love the fair except for the rides. I don’t care for the rides. Mainly I just like all the fried food. Is that just a Texas thing? Because we have some serious fried food at the fair…like all the things are fried.
I’m still laughing at your “oldest and most jaded” line.
oh, I think it’s at least an all of the south thing ;). Only kids did rides; we grownups just helped wait in line. I’m thinking maybe the next time we go should be when all the big kids are old enough to roam around on their own, but Abe is still small enough to be happy with the petting barn and the fried food.
I don’ tthink its limited tothe south – food list from the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto: http://theex.com/assets/pdf/media_centre/Shopping%20PDF/FoodDirectory_FoodBuilding.pdf
Famous for deep fried everything.
ha! good to know we can venture so far north without having to go without grease 😉
My favorite part about the fair is food on a stick. Fair rides kind of sketch me out. Only because they are put up and taken down so many times. But that’s just my irrational anxiety taking over.
I read somewhere a long time ago that Georgia has very strict regulations on carnival rides, compared to most states. I decided to believe it was true while watching my kids hang out 20 feet up on the ferris wheel 😉
It looks like the fair was fun despite the crowds. I think my boys would have loved the petting barn too. 🙂 Peabody is too cute!
We LOVE the Fair – and go every year. The trick is to enter stuff in the homecrafts section. For each entry we get a free admission to the fair, and a second free admission on closing day to pick up our stuff. The boys make a load of stuff (which is sometimes nice) and then we all go to see what ribbons they win! We rarely visit the midway for more than 1 or 2 rides, but love the derbies and animals. You may see a fair entry on our blog in the next week or so.
See, I think our fair is too lame and commercialized to even have that kind of thing. Boo!
Okay, we totally should’ve just met up there. It’s only like 15 minutes from my house! (But we still missed it this year. Parenting fail.)
This was actually the one in Cumming….I was thinking it would be the less crowded of the two close-ish options…but I don’t know if it really was!
My favorite part of the fair was riding the chair lift. My least favorite was when Cormac got lost and I thought my world was ending. I have never been so scared. But after that, I had a great time! I will go back next year, probably. And maybe even see the tigers.
Well, I guess I’d better enjoy our time together for the next year, then….before you get eaten by tigers! Yes–that was very scary re: Cormac. I didn’t even realize it was happening until it was almost over….I went the time went by much more slowly from your perspective!