The Grange Fair

One of the last fairs of the season was the past weekend. And it happened to fit into our schedule for Sunday morning.

The Grange Fair is a combo of 4H type exhibits, produce and animal competitions and of course, rides, games and food. We started out by checking out the animals. Matthew insisted that we go immediately to the rides and games, but we convinced him to take a quick spin around the exhibit tents first.
Quite an interesting array of exhibits this year - including pastel chickens. First I've ever seen.
Whenever any of the animals dared make any noise, Matthew was quick to tell them to "Calm down now, just calm down" (I guess I say this to him too often!).
Of course his insistence comes with the appropriate hand gesture. These geese were not impressed.
So we went along, waving to the animals as we went by.
Checked out some pretty neat produce contests.
And even took in a bit of history.
Then it was game time. Matthew is probably the only 3-year-old who knows what Plinko is - and he insisted this be his first game of the day. As it was sponsored by a local dentist, Matthew was unimpressed with his t-shirt and toothbrush prize.
But we soldiered on. Stopping for a quick photo op.
Oh, Noah was there too, of course.
Our first ride of the day was a tractor hayride. Ish's first ever.
Noah's too.
Then we met up with cousin Mare Mare.
The two of them were pros at the pick-a-duck game.
And they had fun together on the carousel.
While Matt and Matthew were on the Dunbo ride, I tried my luck at a water game.
And I let Matthew pick out a prize when I won. He opted for a big Eeyore.
Break time. Dance time.
Mare Mare was not a fan of this ride. Matthew insisted on going on 3x.We stopped for a quick lunch.
Eeyore was in charge of keeping Matthew's hat safe.

Matt has his hands full.
After lunch it was back to the mania of games.
And more rides.
And when we left (even though Matthew didn't want to), we took the long way home after we looked back and saw this in the back seat.