Fair carnival

On Friday night, we went back to the Clay City fair.  The girls desperately wanted to ride a ride, but there was such a crowd from the parade and it was already bedtime. 

 

Friday night we headed back over to the fair and purchased the girls each a bracelet.  The bracelets allowed them to ride all night for one fee.  This was the first time either of the girls had been on carnival rides. 

 

Our first stop was the carousel. 

 

 

Toby got to take a ride around the fairgrounds, too.  He strolled the entire evening!

 

Our second stop was Super Slide.  Daddy went down the slide the first trip!

They loved it!

Their smiles were priceless.

Jenna even got a little turned around.

They had to ride in the Barbie Jeep!

and four-wheelers!

The smiles were priceless!

My favorite carnie was at the fishes.

He got the kids to make fishy faces!

Then we got home and told the girls they needed to wash their hands.  I noticed Shelby had been gone longer than she should be and the water wasn't running.  I went to check on her and she handed me the scissors.  I looked at her and said, "thank you" not realizing immediately that she had cut her bangs.  I figure that I am one very lucky momma, because the only thing she cut was her bangs and didn't look too bad.  We then had the conversation that only Mommy cuts bangs and Shelby only uses scissors for paper.

Saturday, a day with Thomas

Saturday, June 21 was a big day. First off, it was my birthday!  Friday night we went drove to Greenfield to get us closer to Connersville - our destination Saturday. Lance had purchased our family tickets to take a ride with Thomas.

Thomas rolled into town shortly after we did. 

They had a nice spot for pictures, but the girls were grouchy and refused to take pictures with Thomas.   Therefore, I settled for a picture with a banner. 

They had all sorts of activities for the kids to do while they were waiting for their trainride. They got  to take a ride on a barrel train. 

We had 9 am tickets which turned out very good. It was not too hot or too crowded yet at 9. Jenna sat with dad and Shelby sat with mom. 

Toby switch back-and-forth

During our ride wewent past the Connersville train depot and saw a caboose. 

We saw several old boxcars, refrigerator cars, and other trains. We rode on coach 10 which was built and 1923. It had a concrete floor and old sliding windows. 

We learned several things about the train depot in Connersville while were there. The railroad is operated 100% by volunteers. Having Thomas come to town is the biggest fundraiser for the railroad. The two weekends of "a day out with Thomas" is what keeps the railroad actively running. They run trains regularly from Connersville to Metamora. Though our train trip did not take us to Metamora, that was our second stop for the day. (See next post.)

Saturday part 2

Saturday, after we left Thomas we ate lunch and headed to Metamora. Metamora is home to the Whitewater Canal State Historic Site and Trail.  

Metamora has a canal boat and provides canal boat rides for a nominal fee.

We rode the Benjamin Franklin III, which was pulled by two Belgium horses. 

The horses walked down the tow path, pulling the canal boat.

One very neat and unique feature of Metamora is the aquaduct. An aquaduct, by definition is a body of water that passes over another body of water. 

It was a covered bridge with a bottom full of water that allowed canal boats to pass over Duck Creek, a creek of lower altitude. 

We had a wonderful boat ride.  Metamora had all kinds of little shops in town. One of shops I thought was extremely unique was the cookie jar shop. They had a cookie jar in any design you could dream!

Clay City Fair

This week is the Clay City Fair.  Clay County has a Clay City Fair, a Brazil Fair, and a Clay County Fair.  Wednesday night is always parade night.  We took the kids out to the parade.  They had a blast and got a ton of candy!

 

After the parade we got to visit with a some Clay City Royalty!  Our niece, Kaity, placed in the Jr. Miss contest.

We spent the evening visiting with family, church family, several neighbors, and former classmates of Lance's.  Just before we left, the kids begged to go to the livestock barn.  Jenna really enjoyed the sheep and the pigs. 

This pig had to be one of the most mellow pigs I have ever seen.  It wasn't even phased by the girls petting it's snout!

I didn't get any pictures of Toby.  He was along for the evening.  He cried at the police sirens in the parade.  He visited with another little boy that was born on his birth day.  He saw the animals, but really couldn't care less, as he was trying to fall asleep at that point in the evening.  Overall, we had a nice night out as a family.

Vacation bible school

Our church host a Bible School Program annually.  The girls and I had perfect attendance last year.  This year the girls had perfect attendance, but I only stayed two nights for the adult class.  They seem to have lots of fun with it.  Jenna and Shelby were both in the 4, 5, K class this year.  Shelby was the youngest in the class, as she had only turned 4 a week prior to VBS.  They had a good time and came home singing songs and talking about their lessons.

 

On Thursday night they have a program with the kids.  The 4, 5, and K class is always the biggest with somewhere between 13-17 in the class on any given night.  (Jenna is in purple and white shirt, Shelby is pink shirt to the right).

Here Jenna received her certificate of completion.

Their cousin Kent was also in the same 4, 5, K class.  I got a picture of him receiving his award, too.

Still, weeks later we continue to sing the songs from VBS on our drive to and from daycare!