County Fair Time

Last week was the last week of summer. That also means it was county fair week around here.  We wanted to be able to go a couple of times, but it never worked out that way.  We decided to go on Thursday and I took a half day off from work to be able to spend more time there.

We got to the fair early enough that it was not too crowded.  We told the kids they could pick two rides each.  There are only so many that Benjamin can go on and it gets so expensive otherwise. Benjamin picked the obstacle course along with Henry.  Ben was too short to go alone, so I had the joy of going with him.  And he complained the whole way through!?!

"Mommy, I don't like this part!"

After that the boys rode motorcycles while Frances went on a small roller coaster.  Then she did the helicopter ride and we left the ride area to avoid further temptations.

"Vroom! Vroom!"

We also splurged on some cotton candy for the kids before we picked out dinner.  There are so many food choices at the fair, and my kids picked chicken while I had a taco wrap.  Real fair food, there!! 

Cotton Candy

After dinner, we decided to watch an alligator show and a high wire act.  Both of them were fun and the kids got to hold baby alligators for a picture.  Of course I left that picture at home, so I'll try and remember it tomorrow.  The kids were riveted by the alligator show.

And Benjamin jumped up and down screaming "awesome" through most of the high wire act!.

The kids wanted to go through the animal barns next, so that's what we did.  The had so much fun looking at all the chicken, rabbits, cows, pigs, goats, etc.  My favorite part was when they got to the pig barn a bit ahead of me.  When I came around the corner all three of my kids were snorting at the first pig they had come to.  You could barely hear the kids over the sounds of the livestock, but it was still hysterical!

Not the animal barns

We managed to get most of the way through the parking lot before the kids decided that they were so tired they couldn't walk anymore, so I'll call this trip a success.  We love going to the county fair every year!

Rockingham County Fair

Last Thursday morning we took the day care kids to the fair and had a blast. Ken had the day off, so he came along as a chaperone. Since he had already paid admission and it was his day off, we decided to go back to the fair that evening. We met up with Stacey and her husband and kids. The kids rode a few rides together and then we parted ways. Some of the rides we purchased tickets for, and others were FREE!! I think the kids liked sitting on the tractors just as much as they did going around in circles on the other rides.

We stopped for dinner and then went back to the rides for a little while. Henry LOVED the carousel and screamed when we took him off of it. I rode the whole thing backwards while video taping! I gots mad skillz!

Henry loved looking at all the lights and action of the other rides, but of course he is too young to go on any others. Frances tried out the cars, the motorcycles (twice), the fun house, the carousel, the swings, and another fun house. She wanted to ride the "Dragon Wagon" which is a roller coaster for kids, but they were doing some work on it and we didn't feel like waiting (and truthfully, it always makes me nervous to get on a ride they just "fixed.") Once we had used all our tickets and patience, we packed it up and headed home.

These last two pictures show Frances last year on one of the cars and this year in the same car!

A Whole Week!

Well, I actually went a whole week without blogging. I didn't set out to neglect my online journal for quite so long, but it was a busy week and things just got away from me. Here's a quick update on what has been happening around here:

• Last Saturday afternoon, we packed up the car and headed to Culpeper to visit Ken's family. His sister, Christie, and her boyfriend, Brian, had flown in from Florida for a visit and we wanted to see them. Ken's brother, Dan, had also come up with his wife, Nikki, and baby daughter, Abby. It was a crowded house! We had a great time visiting with them and Frances got to hold her baby cousin and just LOVED it. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures yet because while I did remember my camera; I forgot my memory stick.


• Sunday we spent the day in Culpeper with Ken's family. We tried to go swimming, but Mother Nature had other plans for us. Ken, his dad, his sister, and Brian did get to play golf before the major downpour. We headed back that evening and stopped at Dairy Queen for some ice cream on the way back.


• Monday I was back to work. It was all set to be a crazy day because of all the summer kids being there. I was not disappointed!


• Tuesday I worked at the church. I got quite a bit done in between putting out fires at the Day Care. I managed to get 100 youth registered for religious education classes this year. The bad news, is that is only about half to a third of the ones that were registered last year, so there are a lot more coming.


• Wednesday, I had a fun day planned with Katie. She is going off to college soon *sniff* and we will miss her tremendously. We met for lunch at Burger King. Frances made her a picture frame that says "Frances" and "Henry" on it and we promised to send picture for her to put in it while she is away form home. Then we went to the pool. Frances had fun in the baby pool and Henry "borrowed" an inner tube from another child who wasn't using it and had a great time running around. He did manage to flip himself over in the inner tube, The result was that he floated upside down in the water for a second before I picked him up by the thighs and tried to turn him around. Of course I couldn't get a good grip on him because he was wet and surrounded by an inner tube, so it is quite a good thing that Katie was there to help me out. I aged about 12 years in that instant.


• Thursday I was back at the day care. We took the kids to the Rockingham County Fair. And by "kids" I mean everyone over the age of 2!! We took about 35 kids and various parents on the school bus, church van and Kristen's personal van. We got there and walked through the poultry barn. Then we went to a "Safari Comedy Show" which was rather amusing. After the safari show we ran over to the circus, but we didn't get there in time to get seats, so the kids had to stand. That coupled with the fact that they were hot, tired and hungry means that they mostly grumped during the show. After a pit stop to get some lemonade, we went through the petting zoo and then headed to the park for lunch. It rained while we were there, but no thunder, so we just let the kids play in it. After they were exhausted, we headed back to school. My memory stick wouldn't work, so I borrowed these pictures from Kristen's camera. (Thursday night we went back to the fair as a family.)


• Friday, oh Friday. In retrospect it wasn't actually that bad; but man! did we have some chaos. We had two sick teachers and another with sick kids. We sent a bunch of kids home sick-not fun. And the kids were wild that afternoon! I was ready to pull my hair out-so of course, it rained just enough so we couldn't really go outside. Another one of those days where I can say I earned my weekend!


• Saturday was supposed to be my day off where my wonderful friend Julie was going to kidnap my kids and give me a day to myself!! Apparently Henry got wind of the plan and didn't like i. He threw up three or fours times between 5 and 8 Saturday morning. Never very much, but enough so I couldn't pawn him off on Julie with a clear conscience. But Frances went, so it was just Henry and me home all day. He slept quite a but, ate very little and never threw up again. I slept off and on all day and accomplished nothing of great importance. Oh well, I guess that can be considered a good day.**One exciting thing I forgot...I went to the bathroom and left Henry in the living room with my cell phone. It made a strange beep, but when I came out he had closed it. No big deal, right? Nope, you guessed it-a few minutes later the phone rang, "This is 9-1-1 dispatch. We received a hang up from this number. Do you have an emergency?" Um...no...just a handy 14 month old. OOOPS!!**
  
• Sunday (today) we met Julie at church and retrieved Frances. After Mass I met with some more people who want to get involved with out youth program-AWESOME!! I took care of about 10 more registrations and did a LOT of laundry. Right now there are five baskets that are clean and folded and waiting to be put away. Ken made us dinner and then we went for a walk. No pictures of that because I washed my memory card along with the laundry and apparently that isn't good for them! The new memory card we have is too sophisticated for our camera, so we will have to either upgrade the camera or downgrade the memory card....I'm guessing it will be the card. :(


• Tomorrow starts the last official week of summer for us at the day care. While I will miss my summer class, they and I are all more than ready to move on and get the school year underway.