St. Leo's Fair

We drive past St. Leo's church everyday on our way to school. Every year they have a fair in June. The kids have watched the rides slowly assemble and every morning as we drive past, I hear "Can we go tonight?" This week has been a little busy for us, so last night was the first night we were able to go.

We arrived around 6 o'clock. We were able to walk around and figure out what rides each of the kids could go on and which rides to avoid. The first ride the kids wanted to go on was the Dragon Wagon. The Dragon Wagon was a little roller coaster. Gillian was a little short to ride by herself so Daddy was going to go on with her.  But Daddy was a little too big. We just let John and Gillian ride together.  They loved it.  When the ride was done, Gillian said "Again!" 

 

Daddy took John to the Super Slide and I took Gillian to a small kiddie ride.  She was not too impressed.  

 

We met back up at the Elephants. John and Gillian went together. While waiting in line, John held Gillian's hand and made sure she gave the attendant the tickets. They climbed into a blue elephant and off they went.  Gillian was much happier on this ride, because it went higher in the air.  Next they went on the "Tub of Fun" (basically the wild teacups).  John was determined to spin their tub as fast as possible.  Gillian was loving it, until her head kept bouncing on the side of the tub.  Daddy and I would watch Gillian's face and then tell John to go fast or to slow it down.  Again, she loved it.

Our next stop was the Super Slide.  John was going to go by himself, but there was a last minute change, and Gillian and I went too.  We got to the top of the steps and climbed onto the slide.  John waited until I was settled with Gillian.  He held my hand and off we went.  Gillian giggled the entire trip.  Check out the video below.

We then let John go on a bunch of rides without Gillian.  He went in the fun house, on the elephants, and again in the fun house.  He loved the fun house.  I think it was just because there was a slide at the end.  While John was on the Elephants, Gillian said "No go on the Elephants.  I go on the crocodile."  She kept calling the Dragon Wagon, the crocodile. 

The kids went on the Crocodile, aka Dragon Wagon, two more times.  The last time, they got to ride up front.  Gillian says "The crocodile in the front." was her favorite ride of the night.  We ended up our trip to the fair with a cotton candy to share.  Overall a fun night out with the kids.

 

Pumpkin Picking

This morning we went pumpkin picking with Mimi, Poppy, Uncle T and Aunt Missy.  We walked to the pumpkin patch and Mimi noticed a corn maze.  She asked John if he wanted to check it out.  John didn't hesitate and the two fo them rushed off to the maze.  The rest of us went to the pumpkin patch to pick out a oouple of pumpkins. 

When Mimi & Johnny got back, we heard the whole story of what happened in the maze.  Mimi said, they got into the maze and John said "Mimi, do you have a cell phone?  You will need to text Mommy in case we get lost."  They wandered through the maze and John had to go potty.  Mimi told him it was okay to just go in the maze, because it could be awhile before they got out of the maze.  John argued with Mimi, "I can't go here.  I can hold it."  Mimi looked around and confirmed that there was no one around and told him just go in the maze.  John did and they got out of the maze safely ansd dtarted to walk towards the pumpkin patch.  "Mimi, you need to text Mommy and ask where she is.  So we can find her."  Mimi explained to John that they would be able to find us, the pumpkin patch was not that big.

John started the quest to find the perfect pumpkin.  He used a lot of the same critera as he had last year (check out pumpkin pickin from last year).  It had to have no holes, a stem, round and not too dirty.  After some pretty extensive searching, John found the perfect pumpkin.  We headed up to pay for our pumpkins and decided to stop to feed some of the animals.  John was not too excited about feeding the animals.  He didn't like them to eat out of his hand.  Gillian, on the other hand, loved feeding the animals.  She was very particular about what animals got the carrots she had.  She also liked talking to the animals and would say "Hey! Hey!" 

John found a goat (ram?  I'm not really sure what it was), with three horns.  He told Mimi, "He knocked down all the trees.  He has three really strong horns and knocked down all the trees here."

After feeding all the animals, we paid for our pumpkins and headed to Mimi & Poppy's house.  We had to help Mimi with her new Halloween decoration.  John and Gillian were big helpers and helped Mimi with putting out additional Halloween decorations.  After Mimi's house, we headed home and Gillian took a nap. 

 After nap time, we headed to Thompson Park Day.  I did not realize that it was that big of an event.  We got there and the park was full of cars and people.  They had rides, activities, races and all kinds of fun for the kids.  We immeditely ran to Aunt Betty's Auto Zone.  The Auto Zone had big wheels for the kids to ride, an obstacle course and some building blocks.  John and Aunt Betty ran thru the obstacle course a couple of times and then they built a little building out of the building blocks.  Gillian got to knock it down.  After visiting Aunt Betty, we went to see a magic show.  John loved it.  He giggled and was surprised with all the simple magic tricks.  Gillian got a little antsy, so we moved on and walked around some more.  We tried to get John in one of the races for his age group, but we were just a few minutes too late.  But the ladies running the races still gave John an inflatable ball which was the participation prize.  We walked around some more, and John and Gillian both got to talk to the pumpkin head man walking around on stilts and the raccoon too.  We were only there a short time (today was just a busy day), but we will totally make an effort to get to next year's Thompson Park Day.

Petting Zoo and Craft Fair

Today we met Mimi at Freehold Raceway for Open Space Pace.  Bascially it is a festival for horses in Freehold.  They had a parade, races, vendors, music and a petting zoo.  We didn't get to see the parade of horses through downtown, but we arrived at the raceway in time to walk thru the vendors and go to the petting zoo.

John loved the petting zoo.  Gillian was a little unsure.  She wanted either Daddy or myself to hold her while she leaned over to pet the animals.  We walked around first and let the kids pet and see all the animals first and then we let John feed the animals.  He was a little unsure at first, but Daddy held his hand and showed him how to feed them.  John loved it.  He said "It tickles!"  After watching John feed a few animals, Gillian was ready too.  She fed the alpaca and loved it.  But she did tell me "This one is my favorite." while pointing at the donkey. 

 

After the kids had fun at the petting zoo, we watched a couple of races.  John and Gillian loved cheering on the riders (and horses).  We had a quick lunch and then we headed over to the Colts Neck Craft Fair.  Uncle T and Aunt Missy were there with a few cars from the dealership and a giant pumpkin.  They were giving a prize to the person that guessed the weight of the pumpkin closest without going over.  Uncle T had just purchased a funnel cake when we got there.  I felt really bad because Gillian and John just helped themselves.  We walked around the craft fair for a little bit and ended up buying a replacement funnel cake.  The kids had a great time, and even posed for a picture with the giant pumpkin.   

Un-Fair

Daddy and I planned to go to the Monmouth County Fair tonight. Daddy picked up the kids and I met them at home. We picked up food for dinner and ate in the car. We drove all the way to Freehold and there was a big sign saying that the fair was closed due to the weather. Yes. We knew there was a storm coming but it wasn't due to rain until 8 so we figured we would get a hour or so before the rain started.

Daddy and I had to come up with a quick plan to entertain the kids. Luckily we didn't tell them we were going to the fair. All we said was that we were going somewhere fun. We stopped at Dorbrook park and the kids got to run around and play. They played for awhile and then we stopped to get Italian ice. Daddy decided it was a good idea to get Gillian her own Italian ice. Gillian made a mess. She was covered in Italian ice.