Circus!

I had been planning on going to the circus as soon as I saw the coupons for it at every store in town. I had gone to the very same circus twice when my parents, sisters, and I used to live in this area. What I remembered from it was the elephants - mainly and the fact that other kids were getting to pet the animals, but not me. This time, I decided, I would pet those animals! What I didn't know was that although the petting zoo part included elephants when I was a kid it no longer does, but they had something even better now...

When the big day arrived Ethan and Madeleine had been looking forward to it for over a week already! What child wouldn't be excited to see a bunch of elephants for the first time?! We took our good friend, Ruby with us. It was super hot out - 90's and without air conditioning in my vehicle, we were all sweating. (Well, maybe not Ruby since she is so cool!) On our way there we got some fast food, then dropped by another place for chocolate malt shakes (for us grown ups - Ruby and I) before heading over to the big circus tent to buy tickets nearly 2 hours in advance. I wanted to get good seats. While I was standing in line for tickets a little girl turned around to me and said, "Watch this!" She proceeded to take a drink of soda, then blow it out her nose and front teeth. I wasn't quite sure what to say! I think I probably said something like, "Did that just come out your nose?" because I remember her saying, "Yeah, but I was just trying to push it out between my front teeth."

I was able to get a front row for us before we headed over to the petting zoo which wasn't exactly open yet, but they were allowing folks to look. Ethan sure was excited to see a zebra there, I was surprised to see a hippo, but what we all found interesting (my children and I) was the donkey eating his own manure. I hadn't ever seen anything quite like that before. I mean... I've seen dogs and cats do that, but not animals like donkeys, mules, horses, cattle, goats, sheep, etc. That was weird. I later found out from my husband that donkeys commonly do that (he has read about it...). Anyway, I found it strange!

As we headed out to the vehicle to leave for WalMart (I needed more diapers for town days - I normally use cloth) we noticed a sign with a price for elephant rides, camel rides, pony rides, and I-don't-remember-what-other-kind-of rides! I suddenly realized my mistake. I had chosen a skirt instead of pants for our outing! I exclaimed, "We must check out the capris on clearance at WalMart!" I normally just buy my clothes at a thrift store or garage sales, but we had limited time for shopping, so I decided to do the one stop shop thing. I also decided everyone who needed to go to the bathroom needed to try using the potty at the store since the circus only had those stinky porta potties, which are no fun to use, but especially no fun to use with short people (young children). When we got there I grabbed the diapers, some bottled water (our mason jars full of water probably wouldn't be allowed in at the circus, I figured), capris, and a couple of others things on my list before we paid and headed back to the circus. I changed into the capris before heading in. After carefully avoiding the clown walking around out front we got in and bought elephant ride tickets. We stood in line for the ride when I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. I squatted down praying I wouldn't have to throw up (the porta potties were busy, but even if they weren't I didn't want to have to use one for THAT!) I told Ruby to go ahead and ride with Madeleine on the elephant (Ethan didn't want to). I took pictures of their ride and started feeling a bit better. We headed into the big circus tent after their ride and found our seats. I started feeling much better once we were seated. I'm guessing I felt sick from drinking a bunch of water too quickly, then being out in the very hot sun on top of too much excitement and not enough sleep. I don't know. What matters is I felt just fine sitting down! :c)

I totally splurged and bought a thing of cotton candy for all of us to share, snow cones for Ethan, Madeleine, and Ruby and a thing of popcorn for Ethan. It was quite the event! It was only the second time in my life that I ate cotton candy and the first for all three of my children! I didn't want my own snow cone, but I tried Ethan and Madeleine's. It was the perfect treat for such a hot day, because although it was cooler in the tent than out in the hot sun, it was still hot enough to perspire.

Here are a couple of pictures of my children eating things I normally don't allow (pictures didn't turn out great due to lighting):

The show had just started as you can tell by the excitement in Ethan's face. Not to mention how happy he was over the snow cone!

Madeleine trying not to make a mess.

Robby having fun with the cotton candy.

It was so cute, when the circus began Robby forgot all about the cotton candy he was trying to get and started happily laughing and squealing at the ponies and poodles doing tricks. He stayed entertained the whole time, which was a big surprise for me! I figured he would possibly need to be walked around or carried out during parts, but he did great! He especially loved the parts with the animals - ponies, poodles, elephants, camels, and snake. For me it was fun just watching his reaction to things - his bright eyes, giggles, laughs, even screams of delight! The only thing I really didn't like about the show was how loud it was!

At intermission Ruby paid five dollars to have her picture taken with a giant snake in the center ring! If I had had five dollars left I would have done the same thing with the children, but maybe another time. I think next time I'll take a camel ride, too!

When the show was over (it was a 2 hours long) we left the tent and Ethan, Robby, and I took our elephant ride before heading home. That was really neat and I'm happy I can now say I've rode an elephant! I'll try to remember to add a picture of that here later. I have to get it from Ruby first (my camera had gotten something on the lense by then.)

Later on that evening I asked Ethan and Madeleine what their favorite part of the day was. Ethan said it was the silly clowns and Madeleine said it was the elephant ride. I think mine was probably watching Robby's reactions to the cotton candy and animals in the show.