Renaissance Festival

So I am a geek for all things old and historical, but I have always avoided the Renaissance Festivals because I am afraid that if I went to one I might not come back. The second largest Renaissance Festival in the country is a half hour from my house, and so we had made plans to go with Dean (Owen's best friends) and his family this year. When my work situation exploded we decided that it was not something that we could afford, so we hadn't planned on going. Well, Dean's mom is the Stake Choir Director for our church, and she wanted a hymn arranged, and since I don't have much to do, I arranged it for her. As a way to say thank you, Dean's family took us anyway.

The Renaissance Festival here in Maryland is awesome. It is seriously a little town in the middle of the woods. There are numerous stages for all sorts of performers - some for kids, some for adults, and some for everyone. There are knights and jousting and sword fighting, and everything awesome like that. There are lots of food vendors (plenty of beverages of an adult nature of course) and all sorts of vendors selling clothing, jewelry, trinkets, swords, art and everything else you could probably ever imagine. And then there are the people who dress up; I'm not just talking about the performers and vendors. Probably 30% of the people who attend the festival are dressed up. Most are tasteful, some are slutty, and a few are just plain wrong: (YOU CAN NOT UNSEE WHAT HAS BEEN SEEN!!)

Owen was excited to go, and more than anything else, he wanted to go on a pony ride. So one of the first things we did was find the ponies:

Mount Up!

The Boy was so excited to be on the pony, he was leaning forward and petting it.

This was right before our pony stopped and let everyone know that he was a boy pony...Beki took a picture while he was taking care of business, but I decided to use restraint.

You only get to go around the little path once, but the boy was super excited that he got to ride a pony.

One of the knights before the joust.

This was my favorite performer of the entire day. Hilby the Skinny German Juggling Boy. His humor is just up my ally - he says lots of funny things as asides that most people don't get, but it had me in stitches.

This music group was not very good, but the Boy still got up on the bench and danced.

This is the Fairy Godmother. Owen had been a wuse when it came to interacting with performers, but the Fairy Godmother got him to come up and take a "'Bravery Stone" from her.

And of course there was a play place for kids with slides and a Pirate Ship and all sorts of climbing things.

The Boy handled the rope ladder like a pro.

Owen waited very patient for a turn to be spun around like crazy on the tire swing.

I got sick just watching.

At the end of the day we were sad to leave, but we managed one last smile from the boy for a family photo.

Oh, and next year we will be dressed up with the 30%.