Night at the Circus!!!

The circus is in town!!  We missed it last year, so we definitely had to check it out this year.  Lincoln was so excited and got busy telling Beau all about what we would see.  The theme was dragons this year, and we had to talk about that for a while.  Lincoln says that dragons shoot their stinky breath on people and they fall down, so we would need to be careful!  Funny!  We went to the original downtown El Fenix for dinner before the show and went across to the AAC to find our seats.  The nice usher lady took our family picture, and I was relieved that we were all looking at the camera and mostly smiling!  (By the way, she needs to work on her family picture-taking skills.  She only took one shot, and it was luck that we all looked.  It usually takes several to get a good one!)  I'm thinking we are a pretty cute little family, and we were pretty color-coordinated by accident!  

One of the first highlighted shows was the stunt horse riders.  Those people did crazy tricks while the horses were flying around their ring so fast.  The boys clapped along with excitement.  Beau was pretty quiet for the first few events.  It was really a lot to take in for a 2 1/2 year old, but he got over his trepidation quickly. 

The Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus no longer features tightrope walkers . . . instead they have tightrope motorcyclists with girls dangling below!  We were very observant to notice that none of them had a harness on, and they even did a 360 flip in the air!!   

We watched so intensely, and the boys barely took their eyes of the action below.  Lincoln did stop watching a few times to ask when we took a break to get a toy and a snack.  We had a countdown to intermission,  and he couldn't understand what was taking so long! 

The tigers and lions got everyone's attention!  Beau spent the first part of this show with his hands over his eyes saying, "I don't like this, I don't like this" over and over.  We talked about how he loves his lion at home, and he decided to pry his hands from his face and watch.  One of the tigers was being a bit stubborn to the trainer and Beau shouted, "You need to mind that man, you Tiger, or you will be in trouble!"  That's the spirit!  When the tigers went back in the cage, Beau told me he liked just the lion.   

Finally it was time for intermission, and Lincoln was so happy to take a shopping break!  They picked out silly light up things then had to compare.  So far no one has stolen the other one's toy, but they were already checking each other's toy out with curiosity! 

I had promised that they could get popcorn for a snack, but those sneaky circus people had an amazingly tempting snack table set up in the concourse.  They were selling sno-cones(!) with rainbow colors (!!) in cups shaped like a tiger (!!!), and Lincoln and Beau were done with the popcorn idea and sold on these displays of shaved ice heaven!  So the circus only comes once a year (and we missed last year, right?), and we indulged in this bit of ridiculousness!  One intermission = $80.  No kidding, a sno-cone is $20!  They happily ate 1/8 of the most amazing sno-cone ever and were done.  Now the lion cups are sitting in the kitchen waiting to be drank from NEVER!!!  Wait . . . I think I'm instituting a rule that the cups should be used each day until we recoup the cost.  But they really enjoyed the excitement of ordering them and eating them for 5 minutes, and that's what being a kid is all about!!   

After intermission we saw the trapeze artists and several acrobat troupes.  The boys got excited again when the elephants came out.  There were six big elephants and a baby one.  They performed perfectly, and I weirded myself out a little over thinking the life of a circus elephant.  Anyway, we clapped a lot! 

Last but certainly not least, the theme of the entire show made a brief 45 second appearance in the form of a parade around the stage . . . the DRAGON!!!  The parents were completely underwhelmed, but the boys listed it as one of their most favorite things about the entire show!  Lincoln was happy that we sat in the club level so the stinky breath couldn't get to us.  I wonder if the performers of Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey feel slighted that a mechanical dragon steals their thunder after all of their training and showmanship?   

We had a great time at the circus, and the boys have been talking about it nonstop.  It was a super fun family outing, and I love to watch new things through their young eyes.  Everything is amazing if you just let it be!