State Fair of Texas . . .

We went to the State Fair of Texas yesterday. It is in Dallas, which is about an hour or so away. We left at ten and I was hoping that Phoebe would take her first nap of the day in the car. Well, she had another idea and decided to just cry most of the way there. She never went to sleep. We got to the fair and decided we would eat something before we went and saw anything. I had packed Dallas a lunch and I nursed Phoebe while the rest of us ate. Once we were done I got Phoebe to sleep as we walked to the area with the petting zoo. I was able to lay Phoebe down in the stroller and she slept for about 35 minutes. Grammy pushed her around to keep her to sleep while we went and saw the animals.

The first animal we saw was this pig and I could totally sympathize with her. Her little piglets were attacking her for milk and they were so aggresive. I felt so bad for her but she just laid there and took it like a good mother does. I should be thankful that I only nurse one little piglet at a time.Dallas really loved all the animals. You could buy little cups of food and then every area with animals had shovels attached with strings so you could pour the food into it and hold it for the animal to eat out of. When I say he loved this, I mean he LOVED this. He had so much fun feeding all the different animals. I have never seeing a fair that had a petting zoo with such exotic animals. They had camels, zebras, ostriches, antelopes, giraffe and of course the regular stuff like goats and sheep.

After we went through the petting zoo we headed for the rides. We weren't too sure how Dallas was going to do on these rides. They looked so big and fast and I really thought he was going to be scared. We tried to start him off on something small and easy and work our way up to something faster. He was a natural. If you could have seen the grin on his face during his first ride, it was priceless. He was so happy and almost couldn't believe he was doing something so fun. He would get off one ride and race to find another one to ride. Of course I drew the short stick and was lucky enough to go on most of the rides with him. I don't know if I have gotten older or what, but the kiddy rides were almost too much for me.This ride was enough to put me over the edge. I thought for sure he was going to be scared of it but he wasn't. The cars go around in a circle and then they whip around the corners. I mean, whip around and throw you into the side of the seat. I was a bit scared but of course he was happy as can be. The airplane ride went around in a circle and up and down pretty fast. They had to stop the ride becuase a little boy was scared but not Dallas. He was a natural at all of this stuff.

Daddy took him on his very first roller coaster ride. He loved it!! He also took him on the super duper big slide but I didn't get any pictures because I was video taping it.

We started to have a few meltdowns after this. He was getting tired because we had pushed through without a nap. We decided to leave. Of course he cried as we left and threw a huge fit as we were leaving. I had to carry him to the van where he screamed and screamed. Once we got to the van it didn't take him long to fall asleep. Phoebe had only slept for that 35 minutes at the fair so I was sure she was going to go right to sleep in the van. Well, she cried and fussed and fell asleep 4 miles from our house. That girl is something else.

Overall, it was a wonderful day at the fair. It was alot of work and there were many things we didn't get to see at the fair but it was so worth it. To see Dallas' face on those rides or feeding those animals was worth all the crying that came later. I am so thankful that my parents were here to help us because there is no way we could have done that alone. They took care of Phoebe so we could really enjoy Dallas on those rides. Phoebe was so happy while we were at the fair and it just amazes me that she can function on such little sleep.