Renn Faire Ramblings (or how we accidentally went to Harrisburg)

We had to go back to the PA Renn Faire one last time before it closed for the season. We had enjoyed ourselves so much on our first trip that we bought cheap return tickets to use at a later point in the season. And this time, Willow dressed up!



Costume courtesy of her Grandmother. Willow is seriously one lucky girl - out of the nine Halloween costumes she has had in her life, seven of them were handmade by Grandmother. This time she was a Renaissance girl, complete with a purple velvet cloak - no doubt influenced by our last trip here, because prior to that, Willow had intended to be Cleopatra for Halloween.

This time we decided to take in more of the shows and activities at the Renn Faire (as opposed to all the window shopping we did last time), and this resulted in an active day for Willow. Not only did she ride an elephant for the first time in her life:



I don't think Andrew believed me when I said I have done this before. We used to go to the Vancouver Game Farm (apparently now called the Greater Vancouver Zoo) almost every year as a field trip as kids, and I rode an elephant there as a child.

Willow also got to be a circus performer with Tribal Circus:



They had her hold the spinning plate on a pole, which was very cool... and then they started juggling bowling pins around her:



You should have seen Willow's face - she went from being so chuffed to being on stage to absolutely terrified that these pins are spinning around her! This circus performance was my favourite part of the day - these two were great performers, and they even pulled Andrew up on stage, to his mortification. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of that because he had the camera in his pocket when he went up there.



He had to help Shelly up to her ring in the air by boosting her up. he went to lift her from the waist and she took his hands and put them on her bottom to lift her better. Poor Andrew - he was so red!

Willow even got to meet the queen after the children's costume contest:



My poor, competitive, child - she was upset that no one actually 'won' the contest - all the children who participated received a medallion from the queen. We can't wait until next year to go back.  Maybe next year I will be able to whip up a costume of my own. I could so rock the corset...

(Oh - and the Harrisburg part?  We are driving on the PA Turnpike.  The Renn Faire is on exit 266.  I give Andrew the 2 mile notice.  Then the 1 mile notice.  I start digging in my purse for the toll, and look up and Andrew is passing exit 266...  Words were said.  Maybe angry words.  We had to drive to the next turnpike exit - 20 miles away - at Harrisburg to get off and turn around to come back.  It's a good thing there is good beer at the Renn Faire.)