We made it!!!
As I sit here typing this underneath my travel trailer awning in Camper Village, the aroma of wood smoked brisket and caramelized onions lingers on the air. That's right my friends, we finally got all moved in at the North Idaho State Fair.
After ten months of steer care and showing, multiple months of meetings, paper work, and logistical flimflamery, the culmination of it all has arrived.
In 4-H, the longest, most expensive, and overall hardest project to do is market beef. Of course that's the one my daughter gravitated to, and we've been doing this fair thing for almost a decade now.
That said, it is her last fair as she is to graduate high school next spring and heading off to college, so we are all a bit nostalgic about this particular project. Well, nostalgic might not be the right word.
To start with, the morning of move in day we had to get up at 4:45AM and haul the steer and his stuff to the fairgrounds. Why so ungodly early in the morning you might be wondering? Well, all market animals are weighed in and vet checked, and that had to be done for all species before the fair opened to the public at 2PM. Thus weigh-in started at 6AM, and we live about 45 minutes from the fair grounds.
Thankfully, my girl had all the stuff loaded and we hooked up the trailer the night before, so all she had to do was catch Pumpkin (her steer) and load him. She and my hubs took off to go to weigh-in while the boy and I did chores, threw the rest of our stuff in the car, and went and got groceries to put in the travel trailer for the week.
Camper Village is a chain link fenced area full of about 100 travel trailers, campers, and various other camping abodes for the 4-H and FFA families who live at the fair for the week showing their critters. From 5AM to 11 PM, Camper Village is a thrumming roar of generators, kids giggling as they go to and from the animal barns tending to and showing their critters, and frazzled parents. The reason I bring up Camper Village, aside from the fact that it is my new home for the week, is that a cheeseburger, small fry, and small drink combo is $20 at the fair. We'd all go broke without being able to bring in our own food and drink. YAY!
That said, I will be engaging in some fair food. It's pretty hot today, so aside from a lovely spinach, bacon, and toasted almond salad that I whipped up in the camper, I will most likely be visiting the huckleberry ice cream lady during the heat of the day.
After we got Moo Jr. all moved in, and the groceries put away, I tried to go pick up my wristband from the 4-H office, but no one was there. So of course, since we couldn't get what we needed at the place it was supposed to be, there were security guards harassing everyone at the Camper Village about our lack of wrist bands at the entry gate. grrr
Now, I am pretty easy going, but one of the things I detest about our local 4-H program is they are a tad on the unorganized side. I love the people who run it, but dangit after a decade of you have to do this, follow this rule, or have this thing, NO EXECEPTIONS while at the same time no effective communication of said things or proper logistical execution. Well, let's just say they got the claws of the Kat. Just a little, no one was maimed or injured, but I got things moving馃榿
Wrist band acquired, I got everything else settled in and while my daughter was tending to her moo and hanging her stall card above the beast so people could see how much he weighed, what breed he was, and who owned him, I stole away and checked out the fair right before the gates opened to the public.
My first stop was my daughter's FFA lavender project. She one grand champion and a big ol purple ribbon, which is something she has had her heart set on for years, I am so happy for her.
We also found out that Pumpkin weighed 1371 pounds, what a lovely, chonky boi!
Me though, as I strolled through the garden building first, my smile grew, as I just love seeing all the beautiful things people in my community grow!
The culinary building is probably my favorite, well, that and the garden building tie. I adore looking at all the creative comestibles and it dawned on me that next year, after many, many years of being support staff to my kiddos, that I might actually be able to enter some of my stuff in the fair, YAY!
As I exited the culinary barn, my eyes lit of this purple beast of a car:
Smile even larger, I cut through the middle of the fairgrounds and skipped a bit as the bluegrass band got to plucking.
This creature is part of the pony rides and their pen is right by the entrance to Camper Village. He and I have become good friends because we commiserate over our depleted state together. Yesterday, I hit over 14K steps quickly and who knows how many steps my new long eared friend has taken!
The Army National Guard brought a tank for all the fairgoers to explore, I am pretty sure the tank was in Desert Storm with my hubs, but it looked pretty serviceable for it's age.
After spending a few fabulous minutes with 
It's a lot bigger than I thought it would be. 馃槅
It's the 100th anniversary of our fair this year, which is pretty awesome, so the fair board went all out. There's at least double the attractions and double the attendees this year, so the people watching is beyond lit. I felt like I was on safari viewing exotic wildlife, especially when the young and looking to get inebriated on over-priced liquor started rolling in for the country concert.
In fact, I helped two young, buzzed girls find the line to enter the concert. You see, there were three very, very (like several hundred yards) long lines last night by the grandstand. One was to the margarita booth, one was to the mixed drink booth, and one was to enter the concert. I walked them right through the drink lines and pointed back down the massive line full of scantily clad heathens and proudly announced,
"That's the line you want! Good luck!"
Poor things. However, based on the way the bass from the band rocked my trailer, I am pretty sure they had a good time.
Tonight the band Skillet is playing, so I am sure there will be lots of attendees. It should be another interesting view of human behavior.
Me, well, today is not a show day for my girl, so aside from ice cream retrieval and a viewing of some sort of chocolate competition here in a bit, I probably am not going to venture far from the trailer today. I mean, I had to start off my day by driving down to a tire shop and having a screw removed from my car tire. I've already had a bit of an adventure today. That said, it's fair, who knows what might happened.
I just want this squeeze chute馃槏
And as most of the time, all of the images in this post were taken on the author's steer barn sawdust dusted and cotton candy stickiness encrusted iPhone.