The Circus is in Town!

On Saturday, we headed down to Fairfax to go to the circus.

Before it started, everyone was allowed to walk down on the floor to meet the clowns, performers and see Asia, the elephant. Oliver was asleep about 2 minutes after this picture was taken. (Unfortunately it didn't last too long because someone decided to chase a clown with his extremely loud motorcycle.)

This was Mr. Gravity. He was always trying to bring everybody down. Every time Andrew and I heard his name we wanted to sing "Defying Gravity" from the Broadway musical, Wicked.

Madeline happily smiling for the camera... not! Will she ever get over this "I hate the camera" stage?

Waiting for The Greatest Show on Earth to begin.

Notice Oliver awake again. He actually watched a good deal of the circus.

Madeline liked the horses!

Before going, I knew that I would enjoy it. But, I wondered if the circus would have the same kind of wonder and amazement as it did as a child. I was surprised to find out that it did. These people are pretty amazing. I felt sure, that at any moment, we were going to watch someone fall to their death.

Then I thought, if I joined the circus, I don't know if I wanted to be known as the "dog people". I mean, out of everything they do at the circus, dogs don't seem too impressive. But actually, they were really funny to watch. And they were Madeline's favorite part.

Then came the canon! The first one wasn't real. (But, Andrew did a great job of catching the smoke.)

But, then they brought out the big guns! And sure enough, these women went flying across the arena together.

I wasn't sure how Madeline would react to the circus. She doesn't necessarily like loud noises or lots of people. ( I know, the circus seemed perfect, right?) She wan't all giddy and excited. But, she did watch in amazement. Occasionally she would say, "Look at the elephants, Daddy!"

Speaking of the elephants... I think they were my favorite. I love how they hold each other's tails. They are so magnificent.

After a while Madeline started looking all around her and saw that lots of other kids had cool light toys. So, she wanted one. We won't discuss the highway robbery that occurred when purchasing this toy. I think that next time we go to the circus, we will hit the dollar store first.