Spoonbread...

So, this past weekend was the Spoonbread festival here in Berea. We started off our day by D and I running in the Spoonbread 5K together. It was D's FIRST 5K race. We've been training for a couple of weeks now, and i wasn't sure how things would go on race day itself, but i must say D really impressed me. He made it all the way to the 1 mile marker before even having to walk; our time at that marker was 9min. 48sec. The rest of the race was a walk/jog for us - we finished with a time of 36min. 32sec. Not bad for an 8year old's first 5K. We passed by the free tethered hot air balloon rides while we were running, and D was sad we wouldn't make it back in time to go on one. Maybe next year.

After the 5K, i headed home and relived M of the other kids so he could go to the gun show up in Lexington. I packed up all the kids and took them back to the festival. They had a multitude of booths set up for the festival; all over in the memorial park and in front of the Folk Center. The kids picked up TONS of free stuff from vendors, and samples from food places. They also had the requisite arts and crafts that you'll find at any berea festival - very nice, but a bit overpriced. They had a HUGE kiddieland area where we got to see Ronald McDonald do some magic tricks. D volunteered to 'help', and had the roughest time with the 'magic' wand.

They also had four different huge inflatable rides for the kids to frolic on for free. We hit there first thing in the morning before the crowds, so the kids would finish one and run straight back around to the front to go again, hardly any lines at all! I sent them off together in pairs - one older kid with one younger. It worked out really well, and D and A were a marvelous help to me. I'd pulled out my group of 4 florescent yellow t-shirts that morning and had them dressed the same which made it MUCH easier to keep track of them all.

The local 4-H chapter had also commandeered the Russell Acton Folk Center and set up 'Cloverville.' They had a 'corn crib' sandbox set up immediately inside the door, and all the kids just LOVED playing in it; nice to cool off after the hot sun outside. They also had a small family fitness area set up with stop watches to time yourself on different exercises. They had a cornhole area (can't avoid that here in KY :-) and then a small target area for nerf rifle and archery - D went NUTS over that! A and E enjoyed trying to 'milk' the cow they had setup, and D and A were old enough to make their own personal-sized spoonbread in their 'kitchen.'

They had live music interspersed throughout the festival, along with tons of entertainers and a couple of different clogging groups (yes, we are in BEREA, KY!) We finished off our stay at the festival by going to the small parade, led off by a large contingent from the motorcycle show. All-in-all, we had an awesome time!!

M had a good time at the gun show too, and ran into one old co-worker, and one current co-worker, and ended up inviting both of them down that evening to grill out with us. (i was SO glad that we'd done our Saturday work on Friday night!)