Ohio State Fair

Have you ever been so hot, so drenched in sweat, that you don't even feel it anymore? It wouldn't be state fair time in Ohio if it wasn't hotter than Hades! The boys and I spent five(albeit very fun) hours there at the end of July, but they just about did me in. During the walk back to the car in the afternoon, I began to wonder if I was going to make it...so did Nico, apparently. The last long stretch of hike to the van was across grass--not easy with a double stroller loaded down with almost 70 lbs. of kid and other out-for-the-entire-day paraphernalia. I had to stop for a few seconds at one point to rest and heard Nico call out from the stroller, "Are you going to make it, Mommy?" I did make it and here I am, alive to write about it!



The entire trip was a roll of the dice. While there was lots to do at the fair, we were going primarily to ride the rides and I knew there was a chance that Rocco--all 35 inches of him--might not be allowed. I was going to have a real nightmare on my hands if he (who was allowed to ride everything at Disney World recently) was going to be excluded by a 36" height requirement. Sure enough, many of the Kiddieland rides did have the 36" cut-off.

We didn't let that stop us, though, and devised a little stategy. The three of us simply charged right up to the ride platform each time, as I confidently wore the "Yes, I measured my child and he's tall enough" look. It worked and we only got stopped by ride operators twice. Of course, I never let Rocco get on a ride that I thought was unsafe for his level of maturity/development and also rode with him on others, including his very first roller coaster!

Did you see the giant yellow slide in the video? Nico rode it all by himself with no hesitation. In fact, he started asking to ride it not long after we first arrived to the fair in the morning. The kid has no fear. I told him we would do it last thing and that's what we did. After nearly five hours in the oppressive heat, we hiked 150 steps to the top of that thing (brilliant, Amy...perhaps doing the slide first next year will make more sense). When we got to the top, I handed Nico's rug to the ride operator, who put it down near the edge of the slide. I had no sooner started to tell Nico what to do than he had already plopped down on the rug, inched himself toward the edge and was off to the races. When we met up back at the bottom, he told me how much fun it was as "please don't ask to do it again, please don't ask to do it again" raced through my head. But he was a tired, sweaty mess--like me--and one trip down the giant banana seemed to do it for him.

And now...what set of fair photos would be complete without a bystander sporting a mullet?