One of our favorite family traditions!

Okay, so prepare yourselves for a lot of pictures. Last week the Cowley family participated in one of our favorite family traditions. We spent a day at the Sonoma County Fair. They have so much neat stuff, and each year they have a day where the ride tickets are only $1, and each ride is only 1 ticket, so we go. We can make a great day out of it and everyone in the family gets their fill of rides for under $60!

This year they had this amazing real life garden display that filled a whole barn, but it also had miniature models too. The models aren't really miniature, just scaled down, but it was really fun and the kids couldn't believe how good it smelled in there. The new family picture at the top of the blog was taken here in front of the model of the lighthouse. In the picture below, you can kind of see the model of the old Mill and the wheel. I love this picture, the girls look so sweet, but Nate was too worried that Kimmy was going to fall off the ledge, that we couldn't catch him looking at the camera.

Every year the giant slide is one of our favorite rides. You can really get moving with that burlap sack under you!

Dana and I had a great time going down while holding hands. She needed a little reassurance the first time, but she went on it alone the next 3 times!

This is actuallythe first ride that Nate and Dana went on, and it was really tame compared to some of the others. The picture is a little small, but you can actually see how they both look bored.
This was my personal favorite ride. Nate and I went on it together. It's called the Cliff Hanger, and you lay down flat and soar through the air like you are attached to a hang glider, but we both felt more like Superman! It was awesome. We went almost as high as the top of the huge tree in the background.

I have to be honest, when we go to the Fair, I kind of always expect there to be some sort of meltdown with at least one of the kids. This ride actually triggered the only meltdown of the day, and it was Dana who had it. It wasn't really her fault though. This ride was called the Super Shot, and we had all gone on a smaller version of it earlier in the day, several times in fact. It would take us up about 15 feet and then drop us 10 feet really fast and repeat that about six times. Dana LOVED it! When Nate and Jared saw the big one, that took you up about 100 feet and dropped you 90 feet really fast, Dana couldn't decide if she wanted to go on it. I told her she didn't have to go on it. After getting in and out of line 3 times, at the last second she decided she really did want to go, so I let her, since she was sitting right next to Jared. Well, that turned out to be a mistake, because by the time the drop was finished, she was crying hysterically! It was just too high and scared her too much. However, 10 minutes, a merry-go-round, and some cotton candy later she had forgotten the whole incident!

Here the big kids are again waiting for and then going on the Bumblebee ride. I think you can see the boredom better in this picture.

Kimmy was a great sport about the whole day. She only got to go on the Ferris Wheel with the whole family, but she happily and patiently hung out in her stroller all afternoon, giggling at the big kids having fun on their rides. She is such a sweetie!

The theme of this year's Fair was something along the lines of revisiting our patriotic heritage...So here are Nate and Dana as Paul Revere warning the colonists that the British are coming!

We even got to teach them about our country's early prison system by putting them both in the stockades!

Here's Nate popping a wheelie on one of the rides, while Kimmy (below) is smiling and loving the show!


One of the last rides the kids went on was the Raging River canoe ride. They thought it was awesome that they got to captain the canoe all by themselvese. It was only in about 10 inches of water, but it was cool, it was pushed by jets around a little obstacle course.
They even got to get a little wet.

It was such an amazing day. The weather was nice and there was a cool breeze. There was no arguing, and when it was time to go, everyone happily trotted out to the parking lot without a single complaint! I love my family! One of the things that I always really admired about Jared's family while we were dating, and even now, is that his siblings all got along so well. They rarely fought or said unkind things to each other. I feel proud that our own little family is following in their footsteps as well. It brings me so much joy to see Nate and Dana prefer to spend time with each other most of the time than with their friends. Nate always allows Dana to participate in his games, and vice versa. I love to hear Dana say to him in her make-believe play, "Come on Nate, I made it a two player game just for you!" They are even sweet and mindful of Kimmy, even though she can't quite play in the same way yet.
This picture is from last November, but I wanted to post it here because Kimmy didn't get enough face time in this post, and I think she looks so beautiful in this picture!