This year was my first year going to the Wamego Tulip Festival. I haven’t gone in the past probably due to a combination of not being around and not being able to walk all over the place, neither of which was an issue this year. I met up with a couple of friends and we joined the festivities.
There were bouncy houses for days, and kids could get an all day pass to all the bounce they wanted for eight dollars. I’m ready for adult bouncy houses to be a thing. There were also booths of hand crafted items and homemade food. I picked up a handmade necklace and earring set made from ammunition shells.
The food court offered a few different things: asian noodles, BBQ, and italian sausage sandwiches. The turkey legs looked tempting, but…
…I went with the italian sausage sammy. It was super spicy. FB pointed out the face in my bun by asking me to tag it as a friend. Bun face and I could have been friends, I guess. But I ate him.
Baby animals are the cutest. Besides these lambies, we saw baby chickens and ducks, a calf, and a goat. I’m not sure if the goat was a baby, but he was still adorable.
We found this one lonely little tulip. A few minutes later, we found a few more, but the tulips didn’t seem to be plentiful this year. Then again, we may have just missed seeing them.
On the way to the beer garden and winery, I gave in to the call of the cherry limeade. It was delicious. If I’m lucky, they’ll have these at the Kansas Sampler Festival in a couple weeks.
Other than the expected sore feet, walking was easy peasy. Unfortunately, my body malfunctioned in other ways, and I ended up having to come home after just a few hours. I got a bit of a sunburn, despite using sunscreen, but it was worth it. It was a fun day with good friends, and I’m glad I went.
It’s going on tomorrow, too, so if you’re in the area, I definitely recommend checking it out.
Plans for tonight changed again, and writing didn’t pan out, so Jon and I decided to go to the county fair. We were going to go this weekend anyway for something different, we just bumped up the “when” of the adventure. The last time I remember going to a country fair was when I was a teenager. At the time, I didn’t care about events or animals. I probably cared about the fair food. I might have played some games. But for teenage Amanda, the fair was about the rides. It was that bracelet that gave you a pass to ride the rides over and over again for three hours. Of course, it was also a time when rides didn’t make me nauseous.
As an adult, the experience of the county fair was different, but there were lots of familiar moments. Like the smells coming from the food stands, the people standing in ticket lines, and the whoosh of the ride hydraulics. The smell of animals is standard, as is people in all different manners of dress and lack thereof. Kids ran around and screamed and cried. People pushed through the crowd. Others, like Jon and I, just shuffled along, figuring we’d get to point B at some point. There is something fun about that whole cluster. I don’t think I would have said that six months ago, and maybe I wouldn’t agree on a regular basis. But today I enjoyed it.
We got there early, so we scored a good parking spot. Things weren’t scheduled to start until five, so we had some time to kill, plus we were waiting for my friend to get there before we had dinner. We started out by walking the fairway and checking out the booths and food stands. It’s kind of fun seeing all the deep fried offerings. I smelled funnel cake and was like “Yeah, baby,” but Jon smelled it and it made his stomach churn. At that point though, I was still planning on indulging in something by the end of the night.
I don’t know what a cowboy cheesesteak is, but I want to find out.
We walked through the cow barn and browsed the 4H displays. I was never in 4H, so I didn’t realize all the hobbies one could do through them. Like Legos! Later we found a shady spot to wait. I was fearful of all the bees buzzing around the area. They apparently didn’t care about the number of people milling around, though. None of them stung me, and I didn’t hear anyone else crying out in bee-sting pain.
When S got there, we went ahead and had dinner. They were holding a Blue Valley Pork Producers BBQ, and for six dollars each, we got a pork burger, chips, baked beans, a drink, and ice cream for dessert.
It might not look like much, but it was pretty darn tasty!
I’ve always been pretty anti-bean, but I did taste them. They tasted good, but I have a problem with the texture. However, that pork burger was seriously one of the best things ever. They called it a pork burger, but it was maybe just a pork chop on a bun? Either way, I want another one. And sundae cup ice cream? I haven’t had one of those in forever. Dinner was well worth the six dollars and probably the better option healthwise over the other offerings (someone said turkey legs aren’t bad, but I’m not entirely sold on those).
We wandered into the carnival area to check out the games but ended up opting out of playing any. About halfway around the circle, I got sick to my stomach. The only thing I can figure is that the movement of the rides messed up my equilibrium just by existing in my line of vision. I felt better after a short rest, then it was off to see more animals and watch a sheep show.
Yes, those are sheep in what look like jazzercise outfits. I don’t know. I didn’t ask.
We also saw some other people we knew, one of whom was getting a deep fried Oreo and funnel cake. By that time, the only thing besides dinner we’d bought was water, and we were okay with that. While the smells were still great, somehow both of us had lost that urge to splurge. And by both of us, I mean me, because Jon was kind of “meh” about it from the start.
I told Jon later that it really makes you feel like you’re part of a place when you go to a fair and see people you know.
It wasn’t anything wild or crazy, but it was a really good time and I’m glad we went. I’ll have to cap the night off with some allergy pills to recover and prep for tomorrow’s big adventure (because you know we’ll have one), but that’s okay. Totally worth it!
On the way to the beer garden and winery, I gave in to the call of the cherry limeade. It was delicious. If I’m lucky, they’ll have these at the Kansas Sampler Festival in a couple weeks.
The Romance Factor 