Last Saturday was our 3rd annual trip to Prairie Fest with a group of our neighbors. For those of you not-in-the-know, Pfest is always held around father’s day and is usually at the tail end of the week (like Thursday, Friday, Sat, Sunday). The neighborhood crew always meets up Saturday in the late afternoon. We mark off an area by making a giant circle with our chairs/strollers etc…aka: “the circle of fun”

This year Brian had to leave the festivities early due to another obligation so I was left alone with the boys. Brady has been on a royal reign of terror lately (he’s 2…and doing 2-year-old boy stuff like hitting and pushing and biting to get what he wants…sadly it usually works). Thankfully the older boys were ANGELS, but I was still the first to pack it in and head home…around maybe 8:45, 9:00…can’t remember exactly, but way past bedtime! Thank God, as always, for my wonderful friends who helped me by manning the older boys any time I needed to step away for the restroom etc.

Tradition dictates that we mark our spot, then wander off for games and food. Here is the kid crew before ride departure.

Bray and bestie Jackson

Brady was actually tall enough to ride most of the rides this year. He was thrilled!!

Logan and Sarah

Look at that – Brady even has proper “I’m a daredevil on a ride” form.

Aiden and Mackenzie on the motorcycle ride. This ride had the awesome (mind-numbing) feature of buzzing horns on each cycle which the kids could hold down, and hold down, and hold down, and join in with the other 7 buzzing cars. I felt a little insane listening to it for 5 minutes, I can’t imagine how the guy running the ride feels at the end of his work day!  

While the big kids went to ride a really “big boy” ride, I took Brady for his solo train tour. He LOVED it!!

Each time he would round the corner where he could see me again, he would hunt for my face in the crowd, wave and smile SO BIG.

Here is the really big boy ride…the falling something or other. Aiden didn’t go…Brady was too little…Logan….

LUUUVED it!!!!

Kids love to pet animals. All I could think was “don’t step in poo…don’t step in poo…now wash your hands when you’re done!”

Is this not the coolest thing ever?! I would love to try this sometime!

Back at the circle! Each family (read: mom) brought a little something for the kids. We took turns handing them out in waves to keep everyone occupied. We started with cold pizza brought by us (Brian’s genius idea), moved to pretzels and juice boxes followed by twizzlers, freeze pops and finally…glow in the dark bracelets (brought by me). It was about this time…when we returned from rides, that Brian had to leave.

someone stole my camera (Brady)

The killer B’s: We gave this trio of terror that nickname last summer. The three of them seem to come up with some pretty interesting (and sometimes naughty) ideas. I think we originally had AJ as “the brains”, Aiden as “the beauty” and Ryan as “the brawn”. We were DYING laughing because the killer B’s took their bracelets and, of their own free will, put themselves in handcuffs. We can only hope this is the last time we’ll see a shot like this…well…hopefully never one that doesn’t include glowing jewelry.