Playing Catch-Up, Part 1

Where to begin?

We had a good week at the county fair.

It was SO SO SO HOT in the days leading up to it, that we ended up leaving a few animals home, knowing that the stress from being at the fair combined with the heat just wasn't worth the risk.

We ended up taking 8 calves/cows

and 4 goats

along with the kids' non-livestock projects.

I did not take my camera with because I'm afraid

~I'd lose it

~it would get stolen

~it would get broken

Hence, I have no pictures of the kids or their projects or anything else to document our time there.

On Monday (the day before the fair) we got a phone call from a friend with a generous offer:

to borrow their camper so that the kids and I could stay up at the grounds!

My mom had offered to have the littlest ones for as much time as was necessary,

so I pretty much just kept the rest with me.

Dennis needed a helper at home with him, so the kids traded spots a couple times.

It was so nice to have a place to keep our food cool (no burning hot car with a cooler inside like other years)

not to mention to be able to change clothes or put up my feet!

Dennis' aunt lives in town and so I called her up and asked if we could come shower at her house.

The days at the fair are long ones, so it's not like "camping" as many people would think of--

it's just a place to run back and forth from the barns and show arena.

The kids held up well; 

my legs---notsomuch.

Some big excitement came during the night on Friday;

4:00 Saturday morning to be exact.

I was awake at that time anyway, listening to a storm rolling in,

and then I heard banging on the door of a camper near us.

"Gotta get up!  Get out!  Get up!"

followed by police and sheriff's cars' sirens and announcements of bad weather headed our way.

I had Isaiah, Linnea, Christopher and Elijah with me 

and when they rapped on our door next,

I hopped up and told the children we needed to get up and get moving

right. now.

I poked my head out the door to ask where we were supposed to go,

got the instructions, and we headed over there.

It was very still, which was a bit creepy.

I'll admit to you now (but then only to myself) that I was a bit scared.

Storms do not scare me; typically I enjoy them.

But this time, I was away from home,

in unfamiliar territory, with people I don't know all that well,

and without my husband--who always knows what to do and when to do it.

Linnea and Christopher really don't care for storms

so I was trying to stay pretty nonchalant for them;

I tried to remind them it was just "severe thunderstorms"--

and then a carnival worker who was also in the storm shelter area overheard me and burst in with

"Nooo, no!!  Y'know that storm that rolled through this afternoon?  This is supposed to be TEN TIMES worse than that one was---tornadoes and everything!"

Thank you, Ms. Carnival Worker.

Your words have helped to calm my children immensely.

We stayed there for the better part of an hour and then were given the ok to head back to our campers.

The kids fell immediately back to sleep and I stayed awake listening to the rain 

until it was time to wake Isaiah up to head over to the barn to do the milking.

We finished up our time at the fair later that evening

and I went to pick up the kids who were staying at my mom and dad's.

Bless her heart, she had already bathed to the two little girls so we just packed up everything

and came home to

c.r.a.s.h.

I could only hope we had enough clean clothes for the kids to have something to put on for church in the morning...

stay tuned for Playing Catch-Up Part 2