Irish Fest Fun!

Our long weekend is off to a great start!We decided to head down to the Crown Center for the Irish Fest today. This festival just keeps getting bigger and bigger every year. It started at 11:00 today. We were there by 12:15, and there was no parking left in the garages! We had to park up the street, a couple of blocks away. So, the bonus was that we would be getting our exercise in today too, yeeha!

we immediately headed for the food court, and chose the nearest hotdog stand. As I ordered two hotdogs, I realized the vendor didn't sell drinks,she told me drinks were across the street, so off we went. Now, at the vendor across the street,  I ordered two pops, but, I was told that I couldn't buy drinks without tokens, and that I had to go across the street again to purchase these tokens, then come back to use these tokens to purchase the pop! Talk about crazy! Finally, with our hotdogs and pop, and a few snacks we brought in our backpack, we headed inside to find Suzanne and Bill, where they were listening to some music indoors. We ate lunch w/them, then decided to head back outside. Kayli went to throw our trash away and didn't see that someone had spilled a huge drink of clear liquid on the floor, and she slipped and fell. Seriously, these people could have warned her, sheesh. She said she was ok, so we headed outdoors. We wandered around, checking out all the activities, and Irish vendors...

Kayli and I had walked by the inflatables, and I reported to her that the wristband for playing on the inflatables costs $10.00, and the face painting was $7.00. I told her that we still hadn't been to the market area, where they often sold irish jewelry, and I had a feeling that she might like something there, knowing my jewelry loving gal, so I was going to let her decide if she wanted to hold off on the inflatables to see if there was something she would rather buy at the market. Then, she could decide if she wanted me to spend money on inflatables and face painting, or spend the same money on something she just couldn't live without from the market. She was totally "on board" with this idea! So, we took our time, and looked and looked, and even spent some time inside the Crown Center, where Kayli knelt down on the floor of a shop, and knelt right on a tiny shard of glass, puncturing her knee, and coming to me with blood running down her leg! Well, a bandaid got us on our way, and back outside, where we found an irish vendor that just happened to have something perfect for us! We found ourselves a set of inexpensive matching mother-daughter silver claddagh rings! Kayli and I were both thrilled! Kayli was extra excited that she would get to have something symbolizing the Irish side of her heritage (the one that makes her Irish just because she was adopted by this Irish mom! We Irish folk can make anything true that we want because we believe in fairies and leprechauns and magic and happy endings at all costs!!!)

It was getting very, very hot! I got Kayli some dippin dots, which cooled her off for a while. We met up with Suzanne and Bill again, over in the kid section, where they were listening to an irish group play music on a stage. We pulled up some chairs and kicked back in the shade for a while...

now, we were getting ready to head home, and we were walking toward the exit, when a lady walked up to us and asked Kayli if she would like a FREE "Inflatables wrist band!" She told Kayli she would give it to her if she promised she would use it! Talk about a surprise! So, back we went for the grand finale on the inflatables...

amazing that 4 1/2 hours passed by while we were having so much fun!