The Great State Fair: 2015

I just can't summon the exuberance a state fair post deserves.  If you're craving some, read previous years' posts!  I gush so much it'll make you sick.

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Zeke sniffs out machinery wherever he goes.

Turtle Mound and Indian Village, source of so many of my childhood dreams.  (Fair skin and freckles shouldn't bar one from this, no?)

You can practically see the dreams sprouting.  (And that little Nut Berry could pass for an Indian girl, too.  No freckles to bar her!)

In the longhouse.

Millie stepped into the wool and fibers booth and didn't leave for about an hour.  That girl can chat it up with middle-aged knitters and spinners like nobody's business.  One of the women let her borrow a spindle, and she spent the next seven hours spinning wool roving as we walked around the fair.  She had eyes for nothing but her spindle, and I'm not even exaggerating.  This girl somehow came from me?!

Mom and Debbie came with us this year.  Behold, the dairy bar with an eternal fountain of chocolate milk!  Behold, my children slurping!   Behold, my mother's tan pants!  

Here's a lackluster picture of the butter sculpture.  If she was given a choice, the Statue of Liberty would rather hoist a milk jug high.  (Wouldn't we all?)

The free cow ride never fails to amaze me with its slow pace.

Soooo slow.

Cows aren't known for their speed, though.  

It's their milk that matters.  And their cheese!  John and Annika waiting in line for cheese samples.  

The butterflies were drawn to Debbie.  It's that honey hair of hers.

After playing the player piano (surely you remember it; it's one of the highlights for the girls), Susannah bought a feather for 75 cents.  I took this picture of her an hour later when, quite pleased, she told me, "At least four people said they like my feather."

I was so disgusted with the circus this year that I'm only posting one picture.  We ended up leaving it early (but still later than we should have), completely put off by the world's crassest clown.  The artistry of true clowning is a wonder, but he just ran around like a big dummy telling dirty jokes.

We stayed at the fair for almost 12 hours.  It was a doozy of a day, and we ended it, like always, by using our county fair winnings for the girls to choose one ride apiece.  Millie rode the ferris wheel with Debbie, (pictures at the end of Debbie's post).  Thanks to free extra tickets from a vendor, Zeke and Lu rode on both the helicopters and the kiddie roller coaster.

Susannah and Annika rode on the biggest roller coaster, and the night ended like so, 

with an exit by one gleeful and exuberant child on the right and one shaky and weeping child on the left.  Ah, my little Bird, you were not meant to soar above the earth in a metal car.  Next time, use your wings.

Until next year...