Ventura County Fair 2010

It was time for our annual trip to the fair. Unfortunately, Jim couldn't take the day off work, and the two other friends I was going to go with had to cancel for various reasons. So I braved the fair with three kids on my own and was pretty successful.

We started off in the Gem, Minerals and Hobbies building to see how Daddy's collection did in the judging. I was disappointed to see that a couple of our display cards had fallen down, but very pleased to see a big blue ribbon in his case!! Jim's GI Joe collection won 1st in his class. (I'm not sure how many others were actually in his class, if any, but whatever.) We took a minute to see some of the other collections. The girls thought it was so cool to see some "Littlest Pet Shop" collections and some of them had ribbons. They are already making plans for years to come.

Then we went to the Youth Building. We saw the paintings and the food and found Lizzie's book reports that earned her 6 free rides. We spent a lot of time at the Ventura County Library booth. They had a station to color and some costumes and a big stuffed horse. Mimi was happy to color her 'Wanted' poster while Rachel and Lizzie played dress up. Rachel L-O-V-E-D that horse. She sat on it and said, "Gid-up!" while wearing the 'Woody' hat. It was painful when we finally had to leave.
We also checked out the huge kaleidoscopes and all the handmade wooden toys. Then we made our way outside for some corn on the cob! Lizzie was bummed that she couldn't eat any this year (loose front teeth). She even tried a bite of Mimi's but it hurt. However, the rest of us really enjoyed the best corn all year. It was sooooo good with big huge kernels that were so sweet and it was dipped in butter and salted nicely. Yum, yum! Mimi really wanted a picture with the corn people. She said, "Corn on the cob!" when I took the picture. And Rachel really wanted to hold her own corn. But it was so big, it ended up in the crook of her arm and she was just gnawing away at it. She managed to finish the whole cob.
After corn, we walked over to get cinnamon rolls. They were on my list of things to do this year, but weren't that great, I think we'll stick with a funnel cake next year. But that brought us over to the floral building, so we checked out all the beautiful orchids and african violets and roses. Then we checked out Uncle Leo's Activity center where the kids could milk a cow and pick fruit off the trees. I ran into a friend with her three boys. We chatted for about 20 minutes while the kids just played. They could have stayed much longer too, but we had to get moving. So we ran in and saw the ginormous sow with her 8 piglets nursing and the donkey who made Rachel laugh. After a quick pit stop for an Icee, it was on to the rides.
I bit the bullet and bought the ride tickets before the fair started and they actually weren't too expensive. Between Lizzie's 6 ride tickets and the ones I bought, we did four rides with the four of us and Lizzie and Mimi did two rides with just them. They loved the big slide, but I didn't want to climb all those stairs with Rachel. The big girls also did the pirate ship that swings back and forth. I thought they were very brave. Lizzie smiled the whole time, but Mimi looked a little nervous. Afterward, they both said it was their favorite. They all had fun on the other rides: a train, the helicopters, the teacups and a whale ride. (I think the helicopter was my favorite.)
After all those rides, we were done! We grabbed a bag of carmel corn and a root beer slushy (so good) and headed out the gates. We ended up having to wait about 40 minutes for a shuttle (very bad timing on my part) so we were grateful for the snack! The girls were really good about waiting, because they had food, and we made it home in one piece. It was another great year at the fair. Can't wait 'til next year!