The State Fair

We look forward to the state fair every year in October.

There are lots of carnival rides and games to enjoy. There are numerous concession stands to choose from, including several restaurants (mostly the big chain restaurants), not to mention all the deep fried food you can imagine: green beans, mac-n-cheese, Oreo cookies, Twinkies, cheesecakes, etc....

Fried Oreo cookies

For fun, the kids enjoy a petting zoo, pony rides, pig races and one or two carnival rides (we don't do too many of those). 

Our view from the ferris wheel

Pig Race

But the fair is not only about food and fun. There a lots of learning opportunities also. 

We thoroughly enjoy walking through the barns to watch the cattle judging shows and all the other animal judging. We get to view all the different types of chickens, hens and roosters there actually are. Same goes for pigs, sheep and goats. Last year, we walked through the hens and roosters just as the judge was looking at each bird. I didn't get any pics from that experience, but it was very interesting to watch him handle each hen. One of them clucked loudly as the judge picked her up. She seemed to be saying, "OW! OW!" It was funny.

Poultry Judging

In the past, we have also enjoyed watching horse & mule pulls as well as the tractor pulls. We were sad to learn that neither one of those competitions were going to be at this year's fair.  :-(

Horse pulls

Last year, I discovered the stock dog trials. I don't know if they had been there before, but we wanted to check them out. Have you ever seen the movie Babe? That's what stock dog trials are, except, I don't think anyone has a sheep pig to talk to the sheep thus convincing them to move through each gate and then to the pin. Anyway, I took the kids during the free parking and admission time to watch them.  Very interesting.

Stock Dog Trials

You know the kids can watch only so much of those trials before they become restless. So we headed out to walk through the children's barns to take a look at the other animals and judgings. Um... we didn't find any! 

WHAT?!?  Wrong day?

BUT we did find some activities in one of the children's barnyard. There was a little set up called FARMtastic. There were several little learning stations: a worm dig, an apple-picking tree, a soy bean dig, a bin of plants, and a few others. There was a tub full of free things to take home: pumpkin seeds, color-changing water bottle, and a draw-string bag.

Farmtastic

Farmtastic

There were also a few animals, but I didn't get pics of those this time. However, we did learn a bit about how the chicks grow inside the egg. 

This is such the nutshell version of the excitement, wonder and fun we have at the state fair. I'm afraid if I tried to share every detail, you'd be reading this post until next Friday! LOL

Spending time at the fair is exhausting, but fun and educational. Sometimes we leave the fairgrounds completely out of our minds!