Fair Play

Fairs are big events in Wisconsin, and we've been to two of them recently. Two weekends ago, it was the Ozaukee County Fair. It's free to get in and it's a manageable size, so that was nice. And on Monday night, we headed to West Allis for the State Fair.

Unfortunately, since attending last year's State Fair, Elsa has realized that there are rides at fairs. She's plenty tall enough now for most of the little kid rides and even some of the adult ones, so she was all about the rides. We had a hard time convincing her to look at any animals, or even (prepare to be shocked) to get something to eat. She had a completely one-track mind this year. There were a few rides that scared her, but those were usually the ones that also scared us. For the most part, she was pretty fearless about her rides. She's still sometimes scared to go down a slide, but she could hardly wait to get on the Tilt-A-Whirl. Go figure.

She liked all the rides except one—this really fast spinny ride that I went on with her. It didn't go up and down, but the seat we were sitting in spun at the end of an arm, and the whole arm went in a circle as well. I don't think she liked the g-force that was involved. And it was very much an adult ride, so even though she did meet the height requirement, the bar that went over our laps was basically right in front of her face, which didn't help matters.

Her favorite ride at the County Fair was the ferris wheel. At State Fair, it was the swings.

At the Ozaukee County Fair, we went on most of the rides with her.

Then at the end, since we were almost out of tickets, we put her on a ride by herself—this kiddie ride featuring bouncy cars that went in a circle.

She did just fine on it, and seemed to love being treated like a big kid who could go all by herself.

At State Fair, the rides were more expensive, and since she had some experience under her belt from the County Fair, we put her on a lot more rides by herself this time.

She did the bumble bees ...

The cars ...

The rocket ships ...

The swings ...

Even a kiddie roller coaster ...

We did manage to see a few other things at our two fairs, once Elsa's supply of ride coupons was exhausted.

Elsa goes to the State Fair and .... plops down in front of the TV.

Watching the chainsaw carving contest and posing by one of the finished products (a moose).

My little sunflower.

Playing in the ... cornbox?

Elsa's first corn dog.

Despite preferring the rides to the food, she finished it off.

Claire's wondering where her deep-fried chocolate-covered formula-on-a-stick is. But as usual, this was as fun as it got for her. She's such a trooper, always along for the ride when she'd probably rather just be at home napping.

My little Wisconsinite—she sure loves the fair!