Our State Fair is the Best State Fair. . .

Don't miss it, don't even be late!

Rest assured, Fans, we did not miss the Great Minnesota Get Together, and we were not even late.  Sunday morning found us at the fair not long after the gates had opened.  We were making our way to the animal barns, a route which took us past the Giant Slide.  We dismissed the Giant Slide out of hand in past years because neither Ted nor Julie had ever gone down it before, so not even nostalgia was demanding that they slide down rolling waves on a piece of burlap from 150 feet in the air.  This year, however, we stopped to consider it, and then, we did it.  It's two dollars a rider, no matter their age.  Neither Joe nor Clara was old enough to ride solo, so Ted and Joe rode down together and Julie and Clara rode down together.  Julie's tummy almost instantly jumped into her throat.  You fly pretty fast down this thing!  Clara started giggling about halfway down and the first words out of her mouth after we'd coasted to a stop at the bottom were "Let's do it again!"  After Joe emerged from his slide-induced happy stupefaction, he also wanted to go again.  But we did not.  We save it for another year.  Besides, we had animals to visit.

First up were the chickens because, you know, there's nothing like visiting the roosters at what might as well be the crack of dawn.  (In a word: loud.)  We also visited the sheep, horse, cow, and pig barns.  After the animal barns, we made our way across the fairgrounds, eating as we went, to the John Deere tent where Joe and Clara climbed all over the equipment, including a $242,000 tractor.  Joe was disappointed that all of the vehicles seemed to be missing keys.

We managed to keep Clara awake on the ride home and she took a nearly four hour nap in the afternoon.  Joe has his big boy rep to maintain so did not not nap, but fell asleep in the midst of Stuart Little (as Stuart is heading off in a boat in the Central Park pond and the air is thick with nautical fog!) and did not even rouse as he was carried in to bed.

After the Giant Slide.

That's actually a turkey.

It takes approximately 385 squirts of milk to make a gallon.

Ted visited the oink booth, too.  He just didn't get ears.

Birdie reunited with John Deere.

"How do I turn it on?"