family sandwich: Renaissance Festival

Having lived in Arizona pretty much my whole life I can't believe that I have never been to the Renaissance Festival. I have had tons of people tell me how fun it is and have thought about going and then just got busy thinking about other things. In February I saw a commercial for it and told Deke I wanted to take the kids. So we went this past weekend. It was a lot bigger than I had anticipated it to be and had so much more going on than I thought it would. We pretty much opened and closed the place and still didn't do or see all that was available. It was nice because they had rides for all the kids different ages.

Of course the part I loved so much was the way the building looked. I love that feeling like your stepping back in time. A lot of people dressed in costume which was fun to see even though there were some homemade costumes that were sort of frightening. My kids loved that everyone there called them young knight or sir and my lady or princess. I told the kids that next year we go they can dress up if they want.

Hunter's favorite ride of the day was a simulation of a joust. He was pretty serious about the whole thing : ):)

Emma was beyond ecstatic when she got to ride a llama. One of her favorite books right now is Llama llama red pajama or any of the Llama llama books. She grinned the entire time and kept saying "hi llama, hiiiiii little llama" in her Hudson voice.

Deke of course had to have a turkey leg which he thoroughly enjoyed and between all of us it seemed like we kept stopping to try some new snack and every stand. They were all yummy!

It's fun because all day long they have constant shows happening all the time. We stopped in to watch a "fire eater" which kept the kids glued.

The favorite part of the day for us all I think though was the jousting. We got good seats in the arena and when they announced the king my kids got so excited. Though the girls wanted to know where the queen was. They introduced the four different knights which made me think of seeing a Knight's Tale when I was a teenager. Oh Heath Ledger...sniff sniff. Then they did all sorts of different competitions. Our knight was Sir Maximilian something of somewhere. All I know is the guy was great getting the crowd involved and within five minutes my kids were standing on their benches yelling, "Maaaaax, maaaax, maaaax!" It was so fun to watch. I couldn't believe how much Emma was getting into it and enjoying it.

They were so excited when Max ended up winning! After it was over we went over by the stables and they had a chance to meet Sir Max in person. Emma was a little smitten. I think she had a crush.

I would have gone to the festival just to see the jousting it was so fun. Then we stopped by to watch a juggler and he pulled Hunter from the crowd to help him out. It was awesome because Hunter is so witty that he really brought some humor to the show when the guy involved him in his jokes.

This is probably one of my favorite pics of the day of this cute kid. She couldn't wait to try her hand at archery and by the end of it was starting to get a pretty good hang of it. Isn't she so stinkin cute?

We may have tried on every princess hat, crown, tiara, wreath, hair accessory in the place. The girls kept looking for "real princesses" all day together.

Stopped by the royal farm and pet some cute baby lambs. Look at this little guy....

As we were leaving the animals we heard someone yelling, "all hail the king and queen" and turned to see the king and queen and their royal procession. Ave and Em were so excited to finally get to see the queen and then quickly wanted to know now where were the princesses?

The girls weren't the only one amused by trying on the different hats....

The park closed at 6pm and we were there until it closed down. Hunter picked a cute dragon for his souvenir that wraps around his arm, Emma surprised us all and chose a pink sword and then a wooden sword that she can paint. (Still think it has something to do with Max :) :) ) she has been having a blast sword fighting with everyone and wants us to announce her coming into the room like they did for the knights at the jousting. It makes me smile. Avery chose a hat which I was grateful for since we had stopped to try on so many we might as well be taking one home. Instead of letting the sheer fabric flow in the back though she wanted to wear it in the front like a veil. However you want we told her and so she did. I love that she asked if I would take a picture of her on this "princess bridge" since it was pink and purple with flowers on it and looked good with her hat. Sure sweet girl.