Sunfair, State Fair

Amber is an only child on weekdays again. I am no longer babysitting--the family found a more flexible babysitter who could come to their house, and my last day on the job was Friday, September 29th! Life moves so fast: a curve here, a mountain there, some bumps, sometimes followed by a long breezy downhill. Amber and I are absolutely loving our time together once more. I didn't realize how much I was leaving undone during the five and a half hours of babysitting each day until this week when that time was my own once again. I have been bustling and busy trying to catch up on little things like laundry folding and thrift store visits. After four days of figuring out our new normal, Amber and I are finally beginning to settle into a pleasant groove. She is such a lively little companion, always making sure I know she's HERE. Yesterday I was buried in cub scout activity preparation and she resorted to painting the bathroom cabinets with toothpaste to get my attention.

Saturday, September 30th was another cross country meet. It was at Franklin Park in Yakima, called the Sunfair Invitational. The races coincided with the final weekend of the Central Washington State Fair, so even though the kids and I were still tired from our day trip to Seattle two days prior, we got up early and spent the day in Yakima to support the Grizzlies and their smokin' hot head coach, and also to explore our first state fair. I have been putting this post off all week because I was just so tired all that long day on Saturday, and it makes me tired to think about it. But the meet included a kids' race as well as an adult community race so we simply couldn't be passive bystanders. We warmed up our tired legs and raced!

The first race of the day was the kids' race, at 8:45am. We left home at 7:30am and cut it very close, arriving at the last minute and grabbing their bib numbers. A race official ran us toward the start line. I pushed Amber in the stroller across the bumpy grass as fast as I could, but the race started before we reached the line. So the nice race official had Jay and Rose wait at a gap in the fence until the main pack of kids in the race had thundered past, then she had them merge into the river of runners so they still got to race. I figured since we were running across the park when the gun went off, they still ran the full one mile distance, even if it wasn't exactly the same course as the rest of the kids.

 Rose beat Jay. Always a bit of a touchy subject between them...

 Jay did have a waistband problem: his pants were too loose and kept sliding down! Poor guy, but we were laughing our heads off (quietly, when he wasn't looking of course). The first thing Jay asked when he saw us cheering for him was "is it almost over?" The race was barely half done! He asked in such a miserable voice, with one hand on his waistband, that I started laughing all over again. Cute boy.

 Finish chute chaos.

 Ribbons! Rose got a "top 50" finisher's ribbon, and Jay got a participant ribbon.

 Stroller/lawn chair

After the kid race, we played on the playground and hung out with the cross country team, occasionally catching glimpses of their amazing coach as he dashed around getting people in the right places and recording mile splits. A few hours later, we moseyed across town to the fairgrounds to check it out. Jeff had procured a set of free entry tickets from the ag teacher across the hall at school, and I figured with a free entrance we had nothing to lose. I figured wrong. It turns out we are not "fair people." (no pun intended) People were swarming the gaudy crowded stands lining the road, and all five senses were accosted the minute we turned down the first isle. I wanted to turn around and leave the minute we entered with the throng, but we had walked so far from our parking spot, and the kids had never really seen a fair. So we persevered. It was lunchtime and I had failed to pack us a modest set of PBJs. My poor planning drained my cash supply and I took a quick wallet inventory as the kids ate their greasy fair food. I did not get anything to eat because I had a 3 mile race looming on the afternoon horizon. Arg, I delayed writing this because I know there are plenty of perfectly respectable people who really enjoy fairs, and I don't want to sound snobby or grumbly or rude. Fairs are just not my thing. Ugh. I'm feeling peeved just writing about it.

So I forked over half a week's food budget for a couple of corn dogs and then we walked around seeing what we could see. I had just enough cash left for the kids to choose one ride. Rose wanted to do the Ferris wheel, but Jay is scared of heights, and I couldn't bring Amber on it anyways, so we landed at the merry-go-round. First a long line at the ticket window. Then another line at the merry-go-round. At last we were spinning around in dizzying tight circles on the small junky contraption--music not included, though the loud blaring speakers and screams from the ride next door were. I think the kids liked it ok. I felt motion sick after the first revolution!

After the ride we walked over to the place we should have started: the barns. We went through several barns, admiring the cows, horses, sheep, pigs, chickens, bunnies, turkeys, pigeons, etc. They actually had pigeons at the fair! In spite of my significantly lightened wallet, we were all feeling pretty tired by this point so we hiked back out to the car and drove back to the cross country meet. The parking attendant was surprised to see us. Well, she was actually a citizen selling spots in her yard for $5 parking. "Leaving already?" she asked. "YES!" I replied emphatically. When she looked affronted, I softened my response with a "we have to get back to the cross country meet at Franklin Park." And with that, we were outtathere in a cloud of dust.

It felt so heartland-ish and yet so...bleh. Haha, I just don't like crowds of people and ridiculous pricing.

 Merry-go-round! Jay called it a car-oh-sell. I love when he pronounces words wrong from reading them rather than hearing them.

 Amber's curls were blowing in the breeze created by the surprisingly fast spinning of the merry-go-round.

 We concluded that our Rose is cuter than theirs.

 Unfortunate name of this poor creature. Why not just call it a hamburgerlo and get it over with?

 Rose loved the fuzzy bunnies.

 Jay called the turkeys bird-zillas. They were so huge and fascinating to stare at. From a safe distance--the kids would not get close to any of the fences or cages! Their caution cracked me up. Maybe my horse-full childhood made me brave.

A bunny girl and her Ferris wheel dream. It was a gorgeous day and I joined in her wishfulness over riding the wheel into that big blue sky. 

 If we ever go to the fair again, we'll bring backup so I can ride the Ferris Wheel with Rose.

Back at Franklin Park, the meet was well underway. The grassy course was flattened, well trampled by hundreds of toiling feet. We arrived just in time to watch our favorite freshman girl race (she's in our church ward). I taught Amber how to say "go Kaylee!!" and "you've got it, Kaylee!" and we made her smile when she ran past. Eventually the last race of the day rolled around, and I found myself in a well-used port-a-potty changing gingerly into my running shorts. Jeff and I left the kids on the playground with dire commands of "don't let Amber escape!" to Jay and Rose. Then we toed the faded start line and used the last of our energy racing on the hilliest cross country course I've run since college. Ok, it was one of the only cross country courses I've run since college, but it was very hilly and the hills were reflected blatantly in my less than speedy time. Jeff's 17:15 beat my 24:02 by over seven minutes. Seven minutes over three miles...yeah.

Every time I passed the playground area on the curvy loop-de-loop course, I searched out Amber's curly head to make sure she hadn't run off or been kidnapped, and after the first mile, Kaylee's mom/my friend saw my craning neck from the sidelines and assured me while cheering me on that she had her eye on Amber. My mind was set at ease and I was free to consider the hills ahead. While we ran, the hosts were dismantling the course. The path was lined with orange plastic construction fencing and they were unhooking it from the posts and rolling it up. The whole race had a very last-minute/hurry-up-go-home feel to it. We finished and left for home soon after--Jeff in the team van, and me with our kids in our van.

Playing with friends in the dirt. I'm pretty sure they found a half-drunk cup of soda and made mud out of it. Urban explorers! This dirt pile was right in the middle of a main area and runners and spectators were constantly flowing around these cute kids like a river around a big rock.

 There's nothing quite like a top 50 finisher's ribbon in a race with less than 20 runners! It's a treasure to be sure. Even though I'm getting older and slower, it's still fun to do community races with my husband. It takes us back to our courtship, much of which occurred at track and cross country meets.

We arrived home at 5:30pm, ten hours after we left. It was a LONG DAY! Amber had popcorn and marshmallows for dinner in the car. I told Jay and Rose to get themselves some dinner if they were still hungry after all of our snacking, and I went downstairs to take a shower. Eventually I herded the tired kids into bed and collapsed onto the couch to await Jeff's arrival. It is always good to finally have a conversation with him after a day of seeing him from afar.

We spent Sunday lounging on the couch watching General Conference, and it was restorative in every way.

 zzzz...